Finish Line
by Pentakill Lux
Summary: Rick/Daryl Slow Build. The group has finally managed to fight their way back together and set their course for Washington, but nothing's without a price and Daryl is hell-bent on proving to his family that the price was worth it, that it still is.
1. Road Block

AN: I don't like the format of this platform that much, but I know many of you guys only come here. This came up on AO3 a few days ago and the next chapter will be following with in a few days. It's planned out as a four chapter story for now, but if I feel like I have it in me I might expand the story to include a few more chapters.

For now, enjoy.

Usual Fangirl Disclaimers Applies.

Warnings for everything you'd see on the show.

Spoilers for all current content, including spoilers for use of content from the Comics.

* * *

Life in the Prison hadn't been a picnic, far from it. They'd lost people and lost hope and for a short while Rick even lost himself. There were days where they had to kill the living and nights where Daryl had been sure he'd never see the sunrise and maybe it was the shit days that ended up defining them as a group, but it was the good days that kept them going. Days like the one where Glenn and Maggie brought home the pregnant sow. Days where Carl fell asleep outside with Lil'Asskicker on his chest, hat tipped over his face. Days where Michonne brought home crayons and Beth decorated the courtyard with a floral pattern.

They hadn't chosen each other and most of them would never even have gotten along before the Turn, but somehow they managed to make a home for themselves. For a treacherous moment he'd let himself forget that the world had ended.

He wipes at the bloodstains on his face, but only manages to smear his cheek red from the blood on the back of his hand. He's not even sure if it's friend or foe, but he has a nagging suspicion it's Rick's.

The chilling fear he felt when he saw Rick go down is still lingering in his stomach and he can't shake it, not even as he looks over to see his leader lean against a tree, worse for wear, but alive, which is more than can be said for the guy who had cut Rick. Daryl had stabbed him through the side of his neck with an arrow and yanked it back out to see the blood drain from both sides in heavy spurts and even though it had felt more satisfying than it rightfully should, it wasn't enough to give Daryl a sense of justice. He had given himself a few seconds to search out the cut, his fingers automatically probing to see how deep it was. He hadn't had a chance to get a good look at it since, just enough to convince himself it wasn't deadly as long as they could stop the bleeding, but they don't have anything to bind it with, they'd freeze if they surrendered even the smallest piece of clothing.

Carl is on his back in the snow, knees bent to keep his legs from trembling. The woods around them are quiet and their gasps for air are the only thing to echo between the trees.

"I saw Walkers take down at least two of them." Rick says, crystal clouds forming as he talks. "Can't imagine they'd follow us this deep into the woods, not with the herd this close."

"If we keep driftin' south we should be able ta go 'round and avoid the herd." Daryl says, moving to pull Carl back on his feet. "Yer gonna get sick like that." He finds himself scolding, even if it's Rick he really wants to yell at.

Carl lets himself be pulled from the snow, but it's clear he's absolutely worn.

Still in better shape than his old man, Daryl thinks, eyes falling on Rick again. He's pressing a fist-full of snow against his abdomen in an attempt to stop the blood, but with the cold and the blood loss Rick is skittering dangerously close to hypothermia and shock. He hadn't been in very good shape to start with neither, having resumed his old habit of passing most of his food to the pregnant lady, only this time it was Maggie and Glenn was doing the same thing. As much as Daryl respects Rick and his determination to keep them all alive, he'd wish he could slap the Martyr-complex right out of him, because as it is he's barely useful. If Sasha hadn't twisted her ankle Daryl would have brought her along for this run instead.

"I'm good." Rick lies and they start moving again, even though the pace is much slower this time around. It's getting dark between the trees and while Daryl has no problem leading them in the right direction to avoid the herd Rick and Carl keeps stumbling over branches and roots hidden underneath the snow, making noise and slowing them down. After twenty minutes Rick falls behind and it's clear that he can't go any further with out a break.

"It's getting too cold." Daryl half-lies, coming to halt. "We can't move fast enough in the dark to keep warm."

Carl looks as if he's about to argue, but his eyes follow Daryl's as they flicker to Rick and resigned the kid nods instead.

"I'll build a snow pit for the fire." He volunteers, pulling his sleeves over his hands as he starts digging snow into a pile. It's proof of how far Carl has come that he doesn't blame his father or lose his temper. What ever Rick and Carl had to go through after the prison fell Daryl has the feeling that Rick biting a man's throat out to protect Carl was just the culmination. The little boy who faulted his father for being weak is gone.

Daryl starts gathering twigs and branches, trying to ignore the way Rick just sags in on himself, another fistful of snow pressed to the cut in his side. It takes everything Daryl has to keep himself from pushing Rick's hands away to examine the cut himself. Which was stupid, really. He knew that. It's just that Daryl never realized how much he's come to depend on the fact that Rick could take care of himself. Rick was a survivor, even before the Turn, and Daryl had been drawn to that like a moth to a flame.

Daryl had always been shit on his own. He'd once told Andrea the story about how he got lost in the woods as a kid, made it sound like he wasn't afraid at all.

Truth is he'd been scared shit-less the whole time. That was why he'd tried so hard to find Sofia, because he knew how terrifying it was for a kid to be alone in the dark, with no one looking for you and only your own nightmares to keep you going even though your legs felt like lead.

It was why he'd stayed all those years with his old man instead of running off like Merle had, because Daryl might know everything he'd need to survive, but he'd never been a survivor. He didn't work on his own. He couldn't even shoot his own dad after he'd been bitten, too damn afraid to be alone in the world, how screwed up is that?

He needed someone to follow, a back to watch, and Rick had more than earned that role by now. They are still setting a hierarchy in the group, clashing together when ever a decision has to be made. If Rick shows any sign of weakness there are more than enough alphas in this group ready to step all over him and take his place, but they could look down their army-noses at Rick and his police-honor from up-the-road-aways, Daryl knows who he'd stand by. He'd left Rick once by choice and it had only made him realize, with no uncertainty, where he belonged.

As if the other man has heard his thoughts Rick pulls himself together and starts stripping dry leaves off some twigs, pulling tufts of dry moss from the trunk of a dead tree for kindling.

"I hope the other group had better luck." Carl says, voice rough from the cold air.

"Worryin' about them won't do anyone any good." Daryl says forcefully, kicking a branch free of the snow.

"I wasn't worrying, I was just saying..."

"Well don't." He snaps, regretting it when he meets Carl's eyes. Damn kid has his father's eyes, hard from things they've seen, but it's all that caring and dedication behind them that makes them painful.

It's easy enough to get the fire going, Daryl's done it more times than he can remember, and they bunch together around the timid flames. It takes Rick hissing as he moves into a crouch before Daryl loses his patience with the other man.

"Move ya hands." Daryl orders as he pushes himself to his knees, facing Rick. "If you bleed out yer son's gonna have ta shoot 'is own dad as well." He adds, making a point to keep his voice soft despite the harsh words. He meets Rick's eyes.

The other man looks furious enough that Daryl would fear for his own health if Rick was in sightly better shape, but at least Rick moves his hand, instead using both of them to support his weight as he leans back, allowing Daryl to unzip his canvas jacket for access.

Daryl can't stop himself from squinting at the soaked shirt underneath and his eyes flicker up to meet Rick's once more. Most of the anger has been replaced by shame and Daryl realizes at least some of that anger had been Rick being pissed with himself for getting in this situation.

The hunter runs his fingers over the edges of the wound with forced clinical detachment, but he's still much more gentle than he would have been with his own wounds.

"You could do it." Rick says and it's so apropos nothing that Daryl can't make a connection until Rick continues, "Shoot me, I mean. So Carl wouldn't have to."

"Could I?" Daryl says, unable to keep the rising anger from tainting his voice hard. Of course he could, in fact he'd never even consider letting Carl do it, but the fact that Rick's right now considering a scenario where it's a possibility that any of them would have to shoot him is pissing Daryl off.

Rick seems to read the cause for Daryl's mood, because he sighs and runs a hand over his face the way he does when he's deciding which is the lesser of two evils.

"I'm fine." he says in the end, opting out of an apology. Maybe he doesn't feel he needs to give one or maybe he feels like Daryl would punch him in the face if he tried.

"That's the only words I wanna hear otta your mouth, Grimes." Daryl growls, even though it isn't really. But right now, on this subject? Yeah. "You don't get ta check out. Ever. Ya hearing me?" Daryl waits until Rick lifts his eyes and nods. It's not a promise, they don't make those, but it's close enough that Daryl can go back to his examination.

Carl watches the interaction with something that could qualify as a smile, hands his father a cup of melted snow and goes back to staring into the flames and listening for approaching walkers.

Daryl puts his hands where they don't need to go, but Rick doesn't call him on it. They've all accepted this kind of grooming as part of being a proxy-family. Even Daryl, although he admits it came with liberal amounts of protests the first time anyone but Hershel dared touch him in a way that wasn't strictly acute first aid.

"She just wanted to see for herself." Rick had told him after Daryl had been forced to take the back-seat of the Hyundai after a backwards plunge from a staircase to avoid a walker. Hershel's verdict had been a severe concussion.

"I ain't a freakin' petting zoo." Daryl had shouted, much louder than he needed, just to make sure Carol could hear from where she was fidgeting just out of sight, Lori calming her down.

"She wanted to see for herself that you were okay, Daryl. She was worried about you." Rick had spelled out, hand squeezing Daryl's knee.

It wasn't until sometime after they found the prison that Daryl had forced himself to accept when people reached for him after a close call, when Maggie or Rick or even Glenn would sometimes feel the need to make sure for themselves that the hunter was unharmed. He had never stopped complaining about it though.

Daryl moves his fingers from Rick's abdomen to the bruise on his ribs, noticing how Rick goes stiff with the anticipation of pain. Daryl doesn't have to prod the rib to know it's broken, he saw the kick land and can almost imagine the sound it made when it cracked. He knows he's imagining it, though. He had been too far away, his own voice too loud to hear anything, but he's heard a rib break before, felt it too.

He rests one hand against Rick's hip to keep him steady as he presses as gently as he can, rolling the skin over the curve of the rib to determine the shatter-point. Even prepared for the pain the intensity of it takes Rick by surprise and he shuts his eyes against it. Something between a moan and a hiss melts into whimper in Rick's throat and Rick doesn't even try to hold it back, because right now he doesn't have to and Daryl needs to know exactly what he's dealing with if he's to get them all safely home. Rick knows as much by now.

He gives Rick a chance to brace himself properly before he continues. He's sure the rib is not in jeopardy of puncturing a lung, prays Rick would never have taken that risk.

Rick's looking at him, waiting for Daryl to give some kind of verdict and he's suddenly intensely aware that his left hand is still grabbing Rick's hipbone.

"Bob should be able to fix ya up when we get back." Daryl mumbles, starting to cover Rick back up, but only gets to pulling the blood-soaked shirt down before it gets too awkward for him and he leaves it to Rick to zip the jacket closed. "You should get some rest. I'm surprised ya haven't passed out."

"I'm alright." Rick says as Carl glances over, arms wrapped around himself to combat the cold. Rick holds out an arm to invite Carl to press against his uninjured side. Carl makes a face, but scoots over anyway, resting his head against his father's shoulder. "It was a close call, but we're alright now."

Daryl slides in by Rick's other side, careful to avoid the bruised ribs.

"Too close." He mumbles, not sure if Rick hears.

* * *

When the sun breaks through the lowest branches of the pines Daryl untangles himself from Rick's back and Carl's octopus limbs and pulls Rick to his feet. He hasn't slept, knew he couldn't risk it, so instead he kept awake, listening to Rick's breathing, telling himself that he was doing it because Rick would haunt him through eternity if Daryl had dozed off and Rick had died, turned and bitten Carl.

Carl kicks the sides of the snow pit in to cover the hissing embers and while he looks as sulky as Daryl's ever seen him, he's smart enough to keep his mouth shut. Out of all of them Carl is probably the one who fares worst without decent sleep and Daryl realizes that Carl's probably been awake most of the night as well, worrying about his old man.

Rick actually is pale enough to be worrying, but at least he keeps steady on his feet after Daryl lets go. There's a slight winch when Rick reaches to check the state of his wound, but Daryl guesses it's caused as much by cold fingers as actual pain and in any case his fingers come out free of fresh blood.

"Yer good?" Daryl asks, knowing they really have no other choice than to keep going, but he needs to hear the words from Rick, lie or not.

"Lead on." Is Rick's only reply and Daryl does.

He's never been outside Georgia before, but woods are woods and they all have the same markers. They cross a deer trail veering east, fresh marks in the snow telling him it's worth the slight change in their course. Rick's holding up, much better than Daryl could have hoped for, and when they cross trails with a lone Walker sniffing it's way towards the same deer they are following it's Rick that kicks it down and stabs it.

It turns out to be a young buck that would have grown it's first antlers come spring, but Daryl's happy about the modest size when he passes the crossbow to Carl and hauls the gutted deer over his own shoulders with Rick's cautious help.

"Got it." Daryl says, bouncing the buck on his shoulders to get it into position. There's a warm trail of blood running under his collar and down his back and fat drops of blood slip from his fingertips into the white snow.

Daryl has never thought too deeply about blood. When you mostly live off of what you can shoot you learn to distance yourself pretty quickly. Guts, blood, meat, it's all just a part of staying alive. Some nights you can't risk a fire so you eat it raw, even the most squeamish people in their group have learned that by now.

Human blood is different. Still, even though Daryl's killed his share of people by now, it still feels different on his skin.

It's not that Daryl regrets killing any of the people he's killed. For the most part he's managed to keep pretty cold headed about it, because it's always been an us or them scenario, but even when he'd killed the man who cut Rick in cold rage it was Rick's blood on his hands that had made Daryl's stomach squirm.

"You're fine carrying that?" Rick asks and Daryl notes the slight color in his cheeks, likely due to the cold, but still there.

"Would 'ave been fine carryin' you." He says, testing if there's enough strength there for a smile. It's barely there, but it's enough to bring some life into Rick's eyes and Daryl counts that as a victory.

With Daryl's instructions Carl takes the lead with the crossbow, although the weapon is still too big for the little man, and in the end Daryl only has to corrects their direction slightly before they finally reach the road.

* * *

Unsurprisingly the other Raid Party had better luck than them and not just because no one got injured. Tara, Glenn and Michonne had managed to scavenge blankets, fuel and preserved food from an abandoned nursing home. Glenn even found several bottles of painkillers and prescription antibiotics as well as a box filled with bottles of over-the-counter antiseptic gel.

"Wasn't expecting we'd have to use it quite so soon." Carol says, but her smile is soft as she pads the dining room table.

Rick hesitates, his jaw clenching the way it does when he's under pressure. There's a tightness around Rick's mouth as he unbuttons his shirt and tremors in his muscles as he hoists himself up on the table, but Daryl's pretty sure he's the only one who's looking close enough to notice, knows he probably only sees it because he knows exactly how much pain Rick is in, knows how fucking much a broken rib hurts. It's not until Rick's eyes flicker to the Sargent and Rosita, who's hovering by the door, that he understands why Rick is acting so restrained and stoic. They may not be the enemy, but they're not family either and Rick knows that you don't expose yourself to anyone but your closest, not in the old world and certainly not in this one.

"This looks better than I expected." Bob says, rubbing his hands in antiseptic gel before touching the dirty wound. The irony is not lost on Daryl. "I'll have to clean it and stitch you up, but it doesn't look that deep. Lie down and let me get a look."

Rick leans back on the table and allows himself to be examined again, this time with the same strained resignation Daryl himself offers when people fusses over his injuries. He doesn't flinch while Bob examines the wound and just grids his teeth against the pain when the medic turns his attention to the cracked rib.

"Good news is Glenn found plenty of antibiotics," Bob says lightheartedly. "Bad news is you won't be picking your daughter up anytime soon."

Rick nods and Daryl isn't too surprised to see guilt on their leader's face. They've got Judith back, but Rick barely ever holds her. Maybe it's because there's always blood and dirt caked on his hands these days. Maybe it's because Rick can't bare to hold Judith with the same hands that kill people. Maybe Rick feels the same way about human blood that Daryl does, that it sticks to your hands long after you've washed it off.

"We'll have to bind this, but luckily we're also fully stocked up on fresh bandages." Bob continues unfazed. "But if you expect this to heal then a bumpy backseat is definitely out of the question."

"Guess we're stuck here for a few more days." Rosita says, sharing a look with the Sargent and Daryl's not sure how to tell them to fuck off with their judgmental attitudes with out sounding too rude about it.

Luckily Carol beats him to it.

"The area seems safe enough." Carol says as she sets a bowl of hot soap water on the table next to Rick. "And I don't want to paint the walls darker than they need be, but Maggie's looking worse every day and Sasha's ankle's still swollen. Maybe we should take this as a chance to rest up. All of us." She wrings a piece of linen in the water and hands it to Bob who nods thoughtfully.

"I can't say I know much about pregnant women." Bob says as he starts to clean the edges of Rick's wound. "But tough as Sasha is she could use a few more days to get right."

"We'll give it three days." Rick decides, knowing full well that he'll hardly even have scabs in three days. "Carol is right, we could all use it." He looks to Daryl for support and Daryl can only just manage the faintest nod.

He wants to tell Rick to slow down and hold his damn daughter, to wash Walker guts and human guts and mud and sweat and responsibility off his damn hands, but he ain't about to do that. Because this is how Rick gets them though the tough times, by being a tough sonuvabitch. By being the first one through the door to clear a house and take the watch when everyone, including himself, is exhausted.

If Daryl can take just a bit of that weight of Rick's shoulders he'll happily do it, even if it means agreeing now and finding a way to persuade Rick to rethink it later.

* * *

It's cold enough that Daryl decides it's worth the risk to leave the dear hanging from a thick branch outside the door. The smell will be minimal and the risk of attracting walkers practically nonexistent. Tyreese helps him hoist it up by the hind legs and Carl stands by like Daryl's shadow and Daryl finds that he doesn't mind it in the slightest.

Michonne slides down off the roof when dusk settles, relieved from her watch by Tara who loudly complains that Michonne ate the last M&M's during her watch.

"Sweaty men working makes me hungry." Michonne shouts back, her voice lighter than Daryl has heard it for a long time.

"You sound happy." He comments, giving her a crooked smile when she playfully bumps his shoulder. "Must have been some good M&M's."

"Who doesn't love stale chocolate?" She jokes, ruffling Carl's hair as he joins them.

It had taken Daryl a while to accept the dark-skinned samurai who stuck around the prison like an unsociable cat. At first he blamed it on her tense relationship with Merle, but truth be told Daryl had never meat anyone who didn't have a strained relationship with Merle, including himself. It took Carl accepting her as part of the group for Daryl to realize that his problem with Michonne was that she wasn't, in Daryl's eyes, actually part of the group. She was always leaving, always walking the edge of the camp and keeping everyone at arms-length.

To say he didn't understand her would be an outright lie. Hell, he'd been there himself when the rest of them were trying to find their lives again on the farm. Daryl had been the one always leaving, bag always packed. It had been Rick who made Daryl change his mind, although Daryl isn't sure the other man even knows it. It took Rick far too long to realize that Daryl was loyal to the group far beyond having nowhere better to be, but it had taken Daryl even longer to accept that same fact.

Realizing that Michonne was going through the same struggle didn't make Daryl any more inclined to go easy on her, though. This was Daryl's family and if she was going to stay she was going to understand that it wasn't for lack of better options and he had made sure to tell her as much during a supply run, told her, if you come back now you're staying. These people already lost too much, Carl especially. Rick.

She'd brought back a frilly pillow from that run. For my cell, she'd said and Daryl had told her it was the ugliest god damn thing he'd ever seen.

"I heard you ran into trouble." She says, voice softer and eyes searching his face.

Daryl meets her eyes and nods once. "Rick."

"Yeah." She pauses and shakes her head. "I haven't had a chance to stop by, I know he hates people fussing. He's getting worse than you in that department." She says and Daryl huffs out his indignation.

"Maybe he'd be more pliable if you'd bring him some stale chocolate." Carl chips in with a face that's much too serious for the words he's saying. Michonne bends her face down, smile playing in her eyes as she unfolds her hand to reveal ten smudgy balls lying in colored stains in her palm.

"Good thing I saved him some, then." She pretend-whispers and sets off in a sprint towards the door with Carl at her heals, the kid complaining about injustice and chocolate anarchy.

* * *

Daryl isn't sure you can actually call it walking, the way Judith moves her chubby legs in a wobbly stumble, fat hands practically cramping around Beth's fingers just to stay upright, but that's Beth's words for it anyway.

Daryl is lying on his back on a sleeping mat watching Beth and Judith play. He's not entirely sure which of the two are having more fun, but as Beth bounces the laughing toddler onto Daryl's stomach he begins to suspect it's Beth.

"Ya gonna step all over yer uncle Daryl?" He growls, reaching to tickle Judith's sides until the toddler's squealing with joy. The sound is loud and not entirely pleasant, but it's so rare that Daryl can't find it in himself to care. Usually they have to hide and hope they won't be heard and more often than not their lives depends on Judith being quiet.

She's good at it too. Never did scream much, not even when she was a baby. Now she's old enough to understand when to be quiet, like a natural instinct. Daryl figures that isn't too far fetched.

He bends up off the floor, scooping Judith with him as he gets to his feet. Judith's laughing so loudly she's begins to hiccup and Daryl swings her through the air making plane noises, both hands carefully locked under the toddler's 's getting better at the silly things, things he wouldn't have dreamed of doing before the turn. Hell, even in the prison when Judith was a baby and they were building a home with flowers in the yard and toys on the concrete floor of the cell block.

"Time for feeding the monster." Beth says, slapping her thighs as she moves to get up from the floor. Daryl looks up to find Rick leaned against the door frame, arms crossed and a bottle in one hand.

"I've got it." Rick says quickly and Daryl realizes that Rick haven't been in a room alone with his daughter since the prison, probably haven't fed her more than a few times since they got her back.

"I know. I was talking about Maggie." Beth says with a shrug and squeezes Rick's arm with a shy smile before she vanishes out of the room with one of Judith's stuffed toys in her back pocket. As far as Daryl can tell it's always there, like he has the bandanna.

Judith is making noises now, sloppy wet sounds that tells Daryl she's clearly ready for dinner. He looks up to see Rick staring at them, eyes soft in a way that hurts where it shouldn't.

"You probably shouldn't." He says, keeping his eyes on Judith because it's easier, because he really doesn't want to deny Rick the right to feed his own daughter "Ya shouldn't even be up."

"I thought Michonne was my mother." Rick says and hands the bottle to Daryl, just like that. Daryl takes the bottle with hesitation, but Rick just keeps smiling that same soft smile.

"Guess both you and Judith takes a Village." Daryl deadpans and bounces the toddler on his arm as he presents the bottle to her as an option, waits for the girl to make grabby hands before he surrenders it. Judith makes up for her lack of sound by eating like a starved dog. Daryl isn't sure if all babies eat this much, he doesn't have much experience to make comparisons, but she doesn't seem overweight as far as he can tell.

Rick is moving in behind Daryl, close enough that Daryl can feel the other man's breath ghosting over his neck when he exhales and Daryl doesn't even register that he's leaning back into Rick. Back in the prison it used to be the other way around. Rick would be feeding Judith and Daryl would lean in over Ricks shoulder too see the kid suck down a bottle faster than a barfly downed a beer at 9 am.

Rick isn't touching him, isn't even looking at him, but for some reason Daryl still feels a weight on him. Maybe it's nothing but Daryl's own damn imagination, but for no reason he suddenly becomes self-conscious. "What?"

"You're good with her." Rick says so quickly that Daryl wonders if he'd been waiting for Daryl to ask.

"S'nothing." Daryl says, feeling awkward about the compliment, but oddly happy at the same time. "She just needs a bit of love is all. Truth be told ah never knew kids could be this easy."

"Pretty sure we got lucky with this one." Rick says, smile stretching to his eyes.

Daryl huffs because it's so absurd to have a baby in the damn apocalypse, running for your life and living off what ever they can find and still have the nerve to claim you're lucky. Only someone like Rick would see it like that. Only Rick's mind sees freeway instead of roadblocks.

Hell, that's why Daryl follows him.


	2. Cruise Control

As sad as it is, getting the cars stuck in the snow is a good day, since most days the cars won't even start. Daryl and the Sargent does the best they can to keep the cars running on fumes and frozen engines, but there isn't much they can do in terms of motor vehicle service now that the world's ended. It's not all bad news, though. The snow also means that the Walkers have become less active and on the coldest days they don't see them at all. Rick reckons that they freeze solid, unable to move on their stiff legs and Daryl can definitely see the sense in that.

It does, however, mean that they have to stop hunting in the woods, by Rick's request as much as Daryl's own free will. The snow lies thick between the trees and Daryl isn't about to step on a hungry walker who's napping in a snowdrift. Instead he takes Carl hunting in the open fields, leaving the rest of them to set up camp around the stranded cars. Daryl teaches Carl to lie in wait where the wind blows the earth free of snow, exposing tufts of green that lures rabbits and deer out to nibble. Carl's aim with the crossbow is improving, but it's still nowhere near his skills with a gun and most days it's still Daryl that takes down their dinner.

Today is not one of those days.

Daryl hangs the scrawny rabbit over Carl's shoulder and Carl returns the crossbow with a nod and a badly suppressed smirk.

"Yer gettin' better." Daryl says, padding Carl's shoulder, the two pheasants hanging from his own wrist slapping against Carl's back and they start to head back.

They're less than half a mile out when Carl spots them.

Lying by the roadside, side by side, are five Walkers, almost covered by the drifting snow. They begin to snarl and moan when the two of them get closer, but Daryl can't stop his feet, can't stop walking until he's right in front of one of them. It gives a sad gurgle, but doesn't toss. At some point it's arms froze to the ground, but the reason it's stuck in the first place is the wooden cross spiked through it's chest keeping it pinned to the ground, same as the rest.

Daryl's seen a lot of things and a lot of things that's a hell of a lot worse than this, but still the small hairs on his body begins to rise in a way that even the cold around them hadn't managed.

"There's no way it could be him." Carl states matter-of-factually and Daryl wants to believe him, has to believe him, because there's nothing logical about the alternative.

"Don't tell yer dad." Daryl says, shouldering his crossbow and taking out his Walker is brittle and it's arm snaps when he accidentally steps on it.

When they come back the rest of the group have parked the two other cars in a triangle to the stranded one, which is so deeply stuck in the snow drift that they hadn't even been able to get it out in reverse, shovels or no shovels. Luckily it had been the Sargent himself driving it, which hadn't stopped him from taking Rosita's head off.

They've pushed and shovelled the snow from around the stranded car into high walls, sheltering off from the wind as well as keeping the light from the fire contained, leaving only a faint glow over the camp. Daryl can't imagine it'll draw people, even if there's anyone stupid enough to be out in this weather and after what they've just seen he's not too afraid they'll get overrun by Walkers.

They've spread a few yoga mats out around the fire, but most of the group is huddled together in piles inside the one of the cars to combat the cold, blankets and quilts wrapped around them. Eugene is sitting in the open door of one of the other cars, wrapped in a thick blanket, while Glenn and Rosita are standing around the fire as appointed guards.

Daryl takes the rabbit from Carl's shoulder and nods for him to go join Glenn by the fire. Instead of following the kid himself he guts and skins the rabbit with practiced hands and rubs it in the snow to remove the blood. Then he scrapes the inside of the skin free of fat and sinews before he tugs it away in a plastic bag with two other skins that needs final processing.

"We can't keep going like this." Glenn says and pokes one of the burning logs with a stick, sending sparks flying towards the night sky. He's not addressing anyone in particular, but Daryl still gets the feeling that Glenn has been holding this back until Daryl was back from his hunt."The snow's getting deeper and our snow chains are practically useless. We need to find a place to haul up."

"And put off saving the world?" Rosita scoffs, rifle slung over her arm.

"Maggie's do in less than two weeks. You want her to give birth in the backseat of a frozen car?" Glenn presses.

"With all due respect for your gender," Eugene chips in, apparently siding with Glenn. "but it is highly unlikely that the outcome of that will be positive."

"Shut up, Eugene." Rosita says loudly, crowding him backwards with the anger emitting from her small body.

"Hey!" Daryl says, leaping over the snow barrier and into the circle of light, not stopping until he's behind Glenn, effectively putting himself at the other man's back. "We can discuss this 'till our faces turn blue, doesn't matter a damn thing. What Rick says goes." Daryl looks at Rosita until she backs off with an angry huff. "Now stop bickerin' like a couple of old folks, yer gonna raise the dead."

Glenn doesn't look too happy either and Daryl doesn't blame him. They aren't starving, but the most variation they get is roasted meat or meat soup. Everyone is exhausted from sleeping in cars and they're never really warm, any of them. Daryl doesn't even know how they've avoided getting sick, but with Lil'Asskicker and Maggie, just the thought of anyone catching a cold is enough to give them all nightmares.

* * *

"Cross country road trips used to be a hell of a lot easier." Maggie sighs and Daryl takes her word for it. It's true that before the Turn you didn't have to scavenge for gas, but Daryl's so used to hunting his meals that it makes no difference to him that the Roadside 7-eleven's out of coffee and fresh bagels. The only thing that's different now is that Daryl has people depending on him to succeed. There's kids that needs feeding and, hell, he has a pregnant woman that needs fancy vitamins that Daryl's never even heard of.

The store has been stripped clean of anything edible, but Daryl does find a few bottles of antifreeze behind the shelf and he heads back out to the cars, Maggie, Carol and Beth close behind him with their guns out. They haven't seen a single walker, except the store manager who had locked himself in the back room, but they're all in a skittish mood after a barely-escape last night that cost them most of their sleeping bags and blankets.

Rick, Glenn and Carl returns with a few gallons of gas they've managed to pull out of a truck parked round back and they divide the precious fluid between the three cars.

Daryl leans his gloved hands on the metal roof of the car and tries to work out a kink in his back by stretching like a cat. He hates being stuck in the backseat. Not that he'd prefer being on his bike with the roads like this, but damn if he doesn't miss the sound of that engine.

"I know this isn't exactly ideal." Rick tells him as he leans against the car so his shoulder's next to Daryl's hand and Daryl finds he has a hard time taking his eyes off the point of connection. "We could all use a good night's sleep in a warm bed."

"There's a motel a few miles up the road." Maggie says, voice hopeful and map folded out over the bulge of her stomach. Maggie's as tough as her old man and Daryl knows she'd never ask for this directly. But she needs it and frankly Rick does too, so Daryl is more than willing to take her hint and push the idea.

"It's worth a try." Daryl says, dragging his eyes from his hand to Rick's face. "At least we can scavenge blankets 'n covers. If the place isn't overrun."

"Let's do it." Rick agrees, pushing off the car and squeezing Daryl's shoulder as he moves away. The Sargent doesn't argue, so they get back in the cars, Beth and Tara taking the backseat of Glenn and Maggie's car with Daryl.

It turns out the motel isn't overrun and by some weird luck the place even have an emergency generator out back that Daryl and the Sargent manages to get going with joined effort. The rest of them secure five rooms on the 2nd floor and collect blankets and mattresses from the rest and by the time they've moved their personal belongings up the stairs there's hot water in the pipes.

They agree to keep the lights turned off, instead dividing their flashlights and some candles between them and people scurry into the rooms in more or less random groups. Carl and Michonne takes the first room they get to and Rick waits in the door, holding it open until Daryl joins them. Not that he'd need an invitation or a reason to follow, but the gesture isn't lost on him.

"Dibs on the shower." Michonne says causing Carl to call dibs on the bed.

"You're sharing with me." Rick says, cutting off Carl's sulk with a stare. "Come on. Let's go say goodnight to Judith."

The two of them leave the room and Daryl is suddenly insanely glad they've got metal-scrap alarms on the staircase, because no way in hell could he keep awake for a watch right now and he doubt anyone else could either. He strips off his boots and jacket, folding his vest on top of the pile before he slips under layers of blankets and comforters.

He wakes when Michonne comes out of the shower and again when Rick and Carl comes back to the room, but both times he refuses to move, willing his body to sink further into the mattress. He vaguely registers that someone slips under the covers, but he can't even find the strength to check who it is, just assumes it's Michonne and hopes she won't slap him in her sleep again.

She doesn't. Instead she wakes him two times by stealing most of the covers and the second time he can't fall asleep again. He lies awake, looking at Rick's face in the moonlight that streams in thought the window, because no one thought to close the curtains.

Even in his sleep Rick looks worried and Daryl wonders if the weight of what they're doing and what they've done follows the other man into his dreams. For some reason Daryl's almost certain that's the case. Rick just never stops, can't stop.

Hershel begged him to stop once, Carl too, but all Rick did was find new ways to fight. Dug the ground 'till his hands blistered. Build a shed for the pigs Glenn and Maggie brought home, working himself so hard that Doctor S. had to spend an hour pulling splinters out of Rick's fingers. Pushing himself to a breaking point some days, just at the prospect of putting crops on their table one day.

They never got to harvest any of it.

He hasn't noticed that Rick's eyes have drifted open, pallets of blue reflecting the moon, and he can't help but wonder how long they've been staring at each other.

"When I found out about Lori and Shane... Not killing him was one of the hardest things I've ever done." Rick mumbles and even if Daryl wasn't shocked into silence he wouldn't have known what to say. "Killing him wasn't anywhere near as hard."

Daryl shifts from his stomach onto his side so his whole body is mirroring Rick's and the other man just continues talking.

"The first time I shot a man I went home and got in the shower and cried for near two hours." Rick whispers and Daryl wants to ask why Rick is saying any of this. He wants to get up and clamp a hand over Rick's mouth, but at the same time he can hardly breathe, because if he does Rick might stop talking. "The last time I killed a man I didn't even wash my hands. There's no point anyway, the feeling of blood doesn't go away." His eyes leaves Daryl's for the first time. "It never goes away."

Daryl does get up then. "Get dressed." He says, pulling on his own boots with his back to Rick. At first Rick doesn't move, not until Daryl turns his head and slightly louder growls, "Yer wanna get a pneumonia? Get dressed."

Once they're out the door, Daryl closes it softly behind them and turns to his leader, who looks as lost as Daryl's ever seen him, probably because Daryl hasn't said what the hell they're doing outside in the frozen darkness.

Daryl doesn't hesitate - knows he'll lose his nerve if he does - just pulls Rick into a hug. It's awkward, because Rick is taken completely off guard, but Daryl doesn't let go. He still can't think of a single thing to say so he doesn't. He just tugs Rick's head into the crook of his neck, rests his chin on the top of Ricks hair and holds him.

When Rick finally hugs back it's crushing. Rick holds him as if he forgot how much pressure a human body can stand, but Daryl can take it.

If Daryl had been born into a normal childhood that hadn't given him deep-rooted issues with being touched he might have been a hugger. He reaches for people to calm them or soothe their nerves, small signs of comfort and pads of encouragement. An arm slung over Carol's shoulder and a tickle fight with Maggie, highfiving Sasha and squeezing Carl's shoulder and once he'd even wrapped both arms around Glenn's shoulders from behind and planted a loud kiss on his matted hair in a fit of survivor's joy.

But a hug like this is new, uncharted territory and it takes him until Rick starts shaking before he manages to push his own anxieties far enough down to focus on the sobbing man in his arms.

* * *

"Daryl?" He looks up from the rabbit hide he's working on to find Carl waiting for his attention "Do you think you could kill a walker with a home-made bow?"

"You sure couldn't with those skinny arms." Daryl teases with a smile. "Why'd you want to try anyway, your dad take yer gun away again?"

"No." Carl hesitates. "It's just, you have your crossbow and Michonne has the sword."

"And yer dad has the Colt." Daryl supplies now that he sees where the conversation is going. "What about Glenn and Maggie, then?"

"They have each other." Carl answers without hesitation, like GlennAndMaggie is a fixed point in time and space.

"So you fancy yerself a Robin Hood, then." Daryl quirks an eyebrow as he gets to his feet and manages to draw a uncertain smile from Carl.

"'Cept I'm not a hero." The kid mumbles as Daryl closes the distance. Daryl knows the kid has issues, hell they all do. Carl aren't worse off than anyone else and Daryl is probably more screwed up than the rest of them combined. The difference is that Carl is still a kid and kids Carl's age apparently doesn't have eyes in their damn heads.

"Maybe not the kind ya read about in them comic books of yours." Daryl tries, painfully aware that there's a reason it's usually Michonne that gets stuck with the pep talks "In the old days the heroes were the ones that survived."

"There's a line though." Carl says, blue eyes coming up to read Daryl's face. "Between being a hero and being a villain."

Daryl nods and shifts his weight while he picks his words. "You remember the first time we talked? You were just a kid."

They had been with the group for near two weeks, Merle and himself, and from day one there had been eyes on them. Daryl couldn't take a sip of water with out it being noted into Dale's black book. Merle made a scene of it of course, waving and loudly announcing every time he went to take a dump, but that was Merle for ya.

Daryl was used to the looks; Been dealing with them his whole life. If people look at you like you're dirt for long enough you learn to toughen the fuck up or crumble. Daryl's been close enough to the latter to be happy about reaching the first option.

Only one in camp who didn't look at him like one of the usual suspects was Carl, a scrawny boy with dark hair and blue eyes that he didn't get from his mother.

"My mom says you're dangerous." Carl had said, eyes squinting against the hard afternoon sun.

"Maybe ah am." Daryl answered without looking up from the map he was studying, willing the kid to go away. That didn't happen.

"My dad killed a man once." Carl had pressed on, unfazed by Daryl's lack of participation.

"Yer dad sounds more dangerous than me." Daryl found himself saying. "I couldn't even kill my old man after he'd been bit, even though I knew he'd turn into one of them."

"So what did you do?"

"My uncle killed him."

Carl had been quiet for a while, picking at the bark of one of the posts set up for drying clothes. "My dad only shoots bad guys." He'd confessed in the end. "He's a cop like Shane." And he'd looked so damn proud that Daryl couldn't bring himself to tell him that Shane was a fucking idiot and his dad was probably dead in a ditch somewhere.

Carl's not that little kid any more. When no one was looking he grew into a young man, almost as deadly as his dad.

But Carl isn't Rick. Carl is fragile and insecure about who he is, who he's supposed to be. He looks to his father for ideals, to Michonne for guidance and to Daryl for boundaries. He's lost too much and been too lost and Daryl knows better than most what that feels like.

"You told me yer Dad killed a man, but you were proud of him. You didn't think he was the bad guy." Daryl kneels in front of Carl so Carl is the one looking down at Daryl. "Your dad was your hero. And it's true, even your dad..." Daryl isn't sure if he's crossing a line. "Even yer dad had te toughen up, remember?" He puts a hand on Carl's shoulder, thumb digging into the soft flesh there. "Don't mean he ain't a good man."

"I know." Carl says and there's a tightness in his features that isn't the usual defiance, a twitch of something Daryl guesses might be bad memories. And there's enough to choose from, but Daryl doesn't have a sliver of doubt which one that's haunting Carl the most. Considering what he's been through the kid's come out of it alright, just a little tougher for it. He still flinches when someone touches him, though, still fears the living more than he fears the dead, but he'll heal in time.

Daryl knows from experience.

* * *

Two days later Daryl finishes the bow, a primitive maple recurve.

They've all taken to gathering in Rick's room for dinner, having dragged in the couches and armchairs from the waiting room downstairs. Tyreese and Carol comes through the door, wind filling the room with a flurry of heavy tufts of snow. They've got plates of food, pheasant and rabbit and a bowl of canned sweet corn and Sasha calls them all to silence, thanking Carol and Tyreese for the cooking and Carl and Daryl for the hunting, but Daryl shrugs off the praise, because it really isn't a big deal. He hunts because he loves it, because the crazy fades from the world when he aims his bow and holds his breath before the arrow finds it's target. Feeding his group is a bonus, not a chore.

They're not saints, every single one of them have killed another human being, including Judith who's still teething. They've put their group first when pushed against the wall and all of them would do it again, because they're family now.

Maggie's resting her head against Rick's shoulder while Glenn rubs her feet and Sasha and Bob are in a loveseat, cautious distance between them like they aren't sure if they are allowed to touch or not, like they don't trust that love can really bloom in this broken world.

Beth is on the floor, entertaining Lil'Asskicker and Daryl isn't surprised to see that Tara is seated next to her, taking large amounts of Beth's attention every time she says anything.

Carl takes the bow hesitantly, eyes widening comically before a smile splits his face. "This is seriously awesome ." He says, putting pressure on every word. "When did you make this? I haven't even seen you work on it."

"You sleep a lot." Daryl deadpans, earning giggles from around the room and a tongue from Carl. He gets to his feet and tries the bow out, pulling the string and letting it sing as he releases. His hold on the bow is sloppy and his stance nonexistent, but those are things that can easily be taught.

"When the snow melts I'll take ya out an' teach ya how to shoot proper." Daryl says. "We need ta work on yer tracking anyway, the snow's made ya lazy."

"Thanks Daryl." Carl says and the shy smile he sends Daryl reminds him of a younger Carl who still believed in heroes and happy endings.

For a while the prison had seemed like their happy ending. People had settled, Rick had made his little farm, hell, even Daryl had found peace there, even if he didn't understand why. But how could he? Daryl Dixon had never been anyone before, he'd never had people look to him and see someone worth believing in, worth following.

It wasn't until it all came crumpling down that Daryl realized they'd been building something.

Losing them had damn near destroyed him and it took him a few painful days to regress back to a state where he was content as long as he wasn't alone. Beth wasn't much in terms of a leader or even as support, but she was something. She was a voice and a smile and someone who needed him and Daryl could work with that.

But then, seeing the back lights of that car as it drove away with Beth, Daryl had never been that scared in his life. He knew that if he lost Beth it would mean that the prison, his family and everything he'd come to care about would stop being real. It would mean that any evidence of who he'd become would be gone. He wouldn't be anyone anymore.

For a while, sitting by the train crossing, Daryl had stopped existing, so when he found Michonne, Carl and Rick, well if Daryl was poetic he would have said it felt like finding himself again and Rick had been right -it meant everything . And sure, Terminus had been a shitstorm, but Daryl didn't even flinch when Rick had lain out his plan. He wasn't afraid of dying, hell, he would have followed Rick down in a blaze of glory any day, as long as it didn't mean getting left behind as another piece of redneck trash.

Terminus is something they'd all prefer to forget and move past, just like all the other dark patches they've been through. Like when the farm was overrun and when Lori died and Rick lost himself. Like when Hershel was killed. Like when Daryl died for a little while, alone on that road after his legs gave in from running.

Like when Rosita got taken and the group almost split up, torn between getting her back and going on with their mission to get Eugene to Washington. It's something Daryl still struggles with, because he hadn't wanted to risk his neck for her, a stranger he barely knew, but they did end up going back, ended up finding her and Beth and two other girls in the hands of a man who claimed he was a priest, but turned out to be a devil.

The Reverend had walkers spread out around his house, pinned to the ground with wooden crosses, the smell of death keeping him hidden. So when Daryl and Carl found the five Walkers pinned to the ground Daryl doesn't think he can be blamed for the fact that the sight had gotten his blood pumping the wrong way

Because three months later and Beth still has nightmares, can barely stand to be alone. Daryl has nightmares too, but the kind that haunts him when he's awake, because losing Beth was on Daryl. Beth being taken by that psycho was on Daryl. So it might be something they'd all rather forget, but Daryl just can't.

But he can't tell Rick either, because Carl had been right, it can't be him. Even though the Reverend is still alive out there with those two brainwashed girls at his side there is no way in hell he would have been able to follow them here, kill those people and plant those crosses. There is no way in hell. So Daryl tries to forget, tries to shake it off and be happy about the rabbit leg Carol hands him, because he doesn't want to put anything on Rick that doesn't need to be there.

Carl is still examining his new bow, fingers finding the carved CG under the handle with a smile. Daryl looks up to catch Rick's eyes across the dimly lit motel room and finds their leader looking at him, smile reaching his eyes.

When Daryl later slips out of the door to get the bag of unprocessed rabbit furs in the trunk of the car he's not surprised to hear the door open and close, followed by the crunch of Rick's boots in the snow moving in behind him.

"Thank you." Rick says, not waiting for Daryl to turn around, but when he does Rick's face is so sincere that Daryl feels rumpled by it.

Daryl shoulders the bag and shrugs. "A kid his age should have a hobby."

Rick huffs in surprise at the dry joke and Daryl puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes, lets his hand linger until Rick's hand comes up to cover his despite the awkward angle. It sends a jolt of fire through him, but he does his best to control it, to school the smile off his face and if Rick sees it he doesn't comment on Daryl's indiscretion.

* * *

"You think I'm crazy?"

"No. No I don't think you're crazy." There's no lie in the blue of Rick's eyes, but there's no yield there either.

"Then what do you want from me?" Daryl asks, fighting to keep his temper out of his voice.

"I want you to stop ignoring the position you're putting me in." Rick says and it's so low and so close to begging that Daryl can't form a response. Instead Rick just keeps talking. "We've got a pregnant woman who's ready to pop any day and two people - with the very convincing agenda of saving the world - ready to tear this group apart. Beth's still waking the group every other night with her screaming. And you want to leave, to chase after shadows."

It isn't shadows, though, not anymore. He and Glenn had been on a run earlier that day and the moment Glenn saw the group of walkers he had known, known the same way Daryl had. There had been blood in the snow, which could only mean that the people had been killed that same morning after the snowstorm had stopped, had even been spiked while they were still alive.

No one man could have done this, which meant that the Reverend had found new followers for his cult.

"I gotta know, Rick."

"And I get that." Rick swallows, hand reaching for Daryl's shirt, but never quite making it before Rick pulls it back and steps away, just one step, out of Daryl's space. "I get that, I do."

There's no "but" there, none of the emotional blackmail that Rick usually pulls on him, because he knows that Daryl can't turn Rick down when he begs. Instead Rick just nods, eyes on the floor and hands resting on his hips.

"Tara stayed up all night last night, holding Beth's hand and she still wouldn't stop sobbing. I see the way she pulls away from people, even Maggie. Maggie needs her sister. Beth needs closure. We all need this, you need this." Rick's voice is broken when he finishes and Daryl wants to reach out to him, but he doesn't. He just nods, forcing himself to meet Rick's eyes through strains of hair.

* * *

Most of their fighters volunteers to go, even Rosita, although the Sargent isn't too happy to let her leave.

"I'm gonna cut off his head, tie it to a pole and dance around it." She says spitefully, shouldering her rifle. "And then I'm gonna watch his head turn and then I'm gonna stab it's eyes out."

She's not messing about either. Daryl knows she'd do exactly that if she got the chance. She's crazy and dedicated and smart as hell, but if there's one thing Rosita isn't it's a victim. She walked out of that church like none of it had mattered, but Daryl knows denial when he sees it.

Glenn leans over the hood of the car and points at the map, showing Rick the exact route they had taken that morning.

"We saw trails of people in the town we passed." He says. "Here, Meybeth. There were signs up."

"The town just off the interstate?" Rick frowns and looks to Daryl for confirmation. "I thought you said that looked dead."

"It did when we drove past two days ago." Daryl confirms. "But there were definite tracks of activity this morning."

Rick nods, looking around at everyone who's gathered around the cars. "It's a start. If he's recruiting that's a good place to go looking."

"Probably just a bunch of scared people huddled together." The Sargent says. He's staying back to look after Eugene, but he hadn't hesitated for a second to volunteer his military expertise.

"Glenn, you can take Bob, Sasha and Rosita there. Look around, but don't engage anyone unless you absolutely have to." Rick says, looking at Glenn who nods. "Daryl and I will go back to the bodies you found, see if we can track them from there."

"Can I come?" Carl asks, looking hopeful, but Rick shakes his head.

"Not this time, Carl."

"But dad."

"Not this time", Rick repeats and clutches the back of Carl's head as he wait for Carl's eyes to meet his in surrender. "I need you, Tyreese and Michonne here in case anything happens. It's been a while since we've dealt with other people, but if Glenn's group runs into trouble at Meybeth we need to make sure the rest of you are safe."

Carl's smart enough to know he's getting benched, but it makes him happier to know that Michonne is staying behind as well. And Rick hadn't just said those things to calm Carl down. They've had too many bad run-ins with survivors by now to risk the safety of their most vulnerable, which is why Michonne is staying behind this time. With Rick and Daryl both gone, she's Rick's next choice to protect the lives of his children.

The place he and Glenn had found the bodies is less than half an hour's drive away and it's easy to follow their tracks back in the snow. Rick doesn't say a word the whole way and it's clear he's worried. Daryl can't blame him. The other group is strong and smart and even if they do run into trouble they have all the tools to either fight or negotiate, but that doesn't mean they're safe. None of them are, that's not how the world works anymore, and this is the first time since they geared up to take down the Governor and Woodsbury that the group have initiated anything like this. Even when they went to get Rosita back it hadn't been anything as large-scale as this.

They park the car by the road and Daryl zips his jacket, preparing to go outside when Rick begins to speak

"I once helped take down a man who'd kept his daughters captive on his farm, had impregnated them and twisted their heads until they thought it was all God's will." Rick says, not looking at Daryl. "When we shot him his daughters came at us with weapons, screaming at us. We had to take down two of them. The man survived and I watched the Sheriff interview him after in the hospital." Rick squints and looks out over the landscape around them, a field to one side and thick forest to the other. Daryl waits silently until Rick in the end turns his eyes to meet his.

"It made no sense to me, any of it. I just didn't understand him. He was a pleasant man, clean, smiling, charming. But somehow this man, this seemingly ordinary man had managed to turn the heads of everyone around him and made them in to people who were willing to kill."

"Yer not supposed to understand." Daryl says, because he's met men like that, men who prays on the weak and spins their heads until they forget they have a choice, so he knows what Rick's saying. "If you begin ta understand that's when you know yer really screwed."

Rick nods, face still drawn in fear and worry and Daryl reaches over to pad Rick's knee once before he opens the car door and slips out into the cold.

The bodies are still there, but Daryl and Glenn had bashed their heads in, sickened by the way the people had been left to turn like a twisted joke. There are tracks all around the bodies, tracks that were here this morning and new tracks that's been left after.

"Whoever was 'ere didn't care about the bodies." Daryl says, focusing on the new tracks. "They seem ta'ave been more interested in Glenn and me, even followed our car tracks for a while."

There are foot prints on the road, more than five sets and some are light, but a few belongs to big men, the kind who are usually not so easy to play mind tricks on, unless you come under the cover of being a priest, of course. "They had cars here, two from the looks of the tracks."

They don't hear the cars in time, but Daryl doubts they could have made it back to their own car either way. Two big men and a woman get out, carrying heavy weapons and they don't seem at all impressed with Daryl's crossbow or Rick's gun, for that matter.

But it's not until a third man steps out of the car that Daryl's mind reals, adrenalin flooding his system and blood pounding so loudly in his ears that he hardly hears Rick's voice, swearing beside him. The man isn't armed, but he doesn't have to be, because his companions are.

"And so we meet again on the door step of Hell." The Reverend says, smile twisting into his dark eyes as the largest of the two men pushes the mouth of the rifle against Daryl's chest. "Don't do anything. Nothing at all, Daryl." He continues. "I have a very low tolerance for your existence and Marcus has a twitchy finger."

Next to him Rick lowers the Colt.


	3. Intersection

"Followed your pal Rick into quite a pickle," Merle taunts, just out of focus. "Seems ta me you're back to being a sheep, little brother."

"Hell I am!" Daryl tries to say, and it's a point he feels they should be pretty damn clear on, even if Merle isn't really there. Because being a sheep will get you lost.

Daryl isn't a sheep. He isn't. He needs to know who's in charge, is all. He's been taking orders his whole life, no shame in that. It's not that he doesn't have a mind of his own, hell he knows he does. But every cracker and his aunt has an opinion, doesn't mean it needs airing.

At the camp in Atlanta everything had been a mess. Everyone felt like they needed to speak their damn minds, Glenn, Lori - Dale more than anyone. But that's not how social structure works.

That's not how Daryl works.

But Daryl's gotten better at judging who he wants to follow. Shane had been a loud voice, but he'd been full of air the same way most of those Ranger Joe types were. People like Shane were idiots, but they weren't dangerous and Daryl knew dangerous.

Father Lawrence had seemed okay, hell he had a whole group of older boys Daryl's age who thought this man was the best thing next to Jesus and Daryl could see why. There had been nothing patronizing about the way he spoke to Daryl, no hate, no blame and Daryl had been sold.

Truth was Daryl had been an easy target. His dad had been off with uncle Jess, getting pissed and shooting rabbits in the mountains. Merle had left with his motorcycle gang and this time Daryl had been sure his brother wasn't coming back, so Daryl had once again been on his own.

It just took Daryl too damn long to understand what was going on and he had been close to giving up more than he wanted more than once.

He had been a sheep and he had gotten so, so lost.

Bile rises in his throat and the room blurs around him as his eyes water from the taste and the pain in his side. His ribs hurt when he moves, but mostly it's just a dull pain, so he ignores it.

Rick is near by, unconscious, but alive and they're both tied to a metal pipe that's more rust than not, but still holds his weight then he tries to hoist himself off the floor into a sitting position. He thinks it's been at least twenty minutes since anyone came to check on them, which means they'll probably be by soon, will probably check if they are both still out, still safely bound and then leave them be for another twenty minutes. He hopes, because even if Rick wakes up now he'll be in no shape to fight anyone off.

It takes less then two minutes for them to show, but this time the Reverend and his cronies are flanked by two new men, a bulky one and one that looks like a psycho and they all gather around Daryl who pretends to be unconscious.

Pretends, at least, until one of them kicks him in the side against a couple of already abused ribs and Daryl doesn't have to pretend the way he curls in on himself and tries to suppress a whine, breathing quickly to control the pain.

"Wake up, dog." One of them snarls and Daryl notes his face for later.

"Are you sure it's them?" The Reverend asks, fake concern on his face.

"Nah, I don't know man." The biggest of the two new men says. Rick is awake now, struggling to get into a sitting position. Maybe the term "dog" sat poorly with him, too. "Dude had a crossbow, but I didn't see their faces. There were three of them, though. They had a kid with them."

The words makes the Reverend's face light up. "Carl?" he asks as he kneels in front of Rick.

The look Rick levels on him is one that Daryl has only seen with blood to follow, but the Reverend doesn't seem too affected.

"Well, well, Rick." He continues, shaking his head as he stands back up. "Still leaving bodies in your wake, I see." And even if Rick still looks absolutely murderous, Daryl doesn't doubt that the words strike home.

"Where is Carl now, with the rest of your people? Somewhere safe?" The Reverend asks, sounding conversational, sounding like he feels a hell of a lot safer than he should. Daryl feels like informing him of that fact, growling out, "Never seen a man with such a strong death wish refusin' ta lay down 'n die!"

Rick isn't saying a damn word, isn't going to no matter what they throw at him. He's just planning pain and maiming behind frost-filled eyes.

"I hope you've brought Beth with you." The Reverend says, ignoring Daryl's words, but looking right at him. "How I've missed the sound of her voice."

Daryl gets to his knees so fast his arm almost pops out of the socket as he pulls against his restrains. "You best pray Rick gets to you 'fore I do!" He shouts and his need to get to his feet and end this man is making his whole body shake with rage.

That's not going to happen, though, not now, because the Reverend looks down on Daryl with concern, pity even and sighs.

"I'm quite sure these are the men who killed your friends." He says, looking to the men flanking him. "I know them and I've seen the darkness inside them. Daryl here is a troubled man, capable of just about anything if he feels threatened and Rick-" The Reverend turns his head to meet Rick's eyes, completely untouched by the look Rick gives him. "Mr. Grimes, I'm afraid, is a cold killer, as dangerous as I've ever seen them. This man and his friends have lain more than one peaceful town in ruins." Again he kneels in front of Rick, again keeping just out of kicking distance. "You don't even feel any regret, do you?" he asks, looking absolutely distraught by his own accusations.

"No." Rick says and Daryl can feel his stomach drop. "No I don't"

"There you have it, a confession in front of the Lord." The Reverend says, bowing his head to pray. When he's done he gives a court nod and the four men are on Rick in an instant, pulling him to his feet and untying him from the iron pipe so they can take him along.

Daryl struggles with the nylon rope around his wrists, biting down the pain when it cuts through his skin. He twists to get his front against the wall, arms now crossed and he grabs the iron bar and yanks. The structure of the building gives slightly, drywall and dust falling into his hair and he pulls again and again, feet against the wall so his whole weight goes into the movement. The sounds that leave his mouth are primal and terrified, closer to a whimper at times, but he doesn't give up, until the pipe gives and the screws that holds it in place comes out of the rotten wall.

He hits the floor on his back and scrambles to his feet, feeling dizzy as the pain in his body returns full force. They haven't been kind enough to leave his crossbow lying around. He knows they took it to use as a plaything when they stripped them of weapons on the road and he hasn't seen it since, but there's a broom in the corner and Daryl snaps the handle with a stomp, staggering against the pain that shoots through his side at the movement.

He needs to stop by the door, needs to catch his breath and and listen for any source of threat on the other side. The voices sounds far away, getting fainter, but he's pretty sure that's just him loosing focus, not them actually moving away. He opens the door carefully, finding the next room blessedly empty, but the door at the other side of the room is ajar.

Cold air is seeping through the open door and he moves to it, stopping again to get his bearings.

He hears a blow land, fist against face and when he reaches the crack in the door he can see Rick on his knees, gun pressed to his bowed head. Daryl feels hot rage flood his system. For a moment he doesn't care that he isn't armed, is ready to enter this gunfight with nothing but his fists, but it never comes to that.

The sound of an engine makes the small group break up and on the Reverend's order the two men holding Rick start dragging him back towards the cabin. They are at the door when the Reverend and his people stops the red minibus a good distance from the house and Daryl doesn't wait to see who's joining the party. Instead he moves back against the wall to where the door will hide him when it opens and breathes deeply to clear his head.

"Don't screw this up, baby brother." Merle sing-songs. "Do and you're dead."

Daryl stabs the first man who steps through the door in the head as if he was a walker, sinking the stick into his temple before he can even react, but his scull isn't as brittle and it takes a hell of a lot more effort than Daryl expected. By the time he's ready to take on the other man there's already a gun pointing at him, but Daryl isn't afraid to die and the man, who clearly hadn't accounted for Daryl being willing to rush him, stumbles backwards and gives a surprised grunt when Daryl grabs for his gun. There's the sound of fingers breaking before Daryl gets the gun twisted out of the man's grasp.

The man is wide-eyed and flails his arms out in surrender. "You can't shoot me," He says quickly, half-sobbing and for a flash second he reminds Daryl of the kid who caused them so much grief at the farm - Randall. "They'll hear you and come running."

It's an excellent point, Daryl has to give him that, so he pulls the man from the floor by his shirt and knocks him back on the floor with a swing that sends daggers through his own ribcage. His vision is hazy, but he manages to pull Rick to his feet, the other man slowly waking as Daryl manhandles him. Rick is in no better shape than Daryl, but he takes the gun and lets Daryl support him to the broken window. They help each other through and duck behind shrubs, half-crawling in between the trees and out of sight.

The car they arrived in is parked behind the cabin and Daryl leaves Rick to search the car and goes to keep look out. He can hear shouting out front, arguing and haggling, and he moves back to the car, coming up at Rick's side just as the leader pulls his crossbow out of the trunk.

They arm themselves with a hunting knife they find and two guns that's half empty of bullets, but a treasure in their current situation. Rick also pulls out a shirt, probably discarded because it's more rag than actual clothes, but Rick isn't looking to wear it. Instead he bends his knee and straps the shirt around his thigh and shit, Daryl had forgotten all about that.

He'd been knocked out on the road, face planted in the snow, when he head the shot go off. For a few paralyzing seconds he thought they'd actually executed Rick right there on the road, but then he heard the yell of pain and a few fragments of the conversation and realized they had just grazed Rick in the thigh to get him to kneel. Daryl passed out from his own pain shortly after that.

The yelling out front is getting worse and Daryl taps Rick's shoulder, signaling for the other man to follow him out of the clearing and into the woods and Rick does.

"They'll be able to track us." Rick says as soon as they're far enough away and Daryl nods. Even a child would be able to follow their footprints in the snow and the traces of blood they're both leaving when they move, but there's nothing they can do to cover their tracks now.

"Gettin' dark soon." Daryl says, stopping Rick with a hand movement to listen for any sound that might indicate that people are following them. "We just need ta keep ahead and then we'll run in the dark."

Rick nods and grids his teeth, fights to his feet with help from Daryl and they move on. At one point two gunshots ring out behind them as the two groups apparently take their argument up a notch and Daryl takes that as a good sign, means no one will be following them any time soon.

When the darkness does come it's near instant between the heavy cover of the pines and Rick starts struggling to keep up.

"Daryl." Rick gasps as he stops running and Daryl has to remind himself that as tough as Rick is he's a hell of a lot less used to taking a blunt beating than Daryl is. He hasn't taken the time to check Rick's injuries, but he knows his own and if they don't find a place to hide up soon they'll both be dead before dawn.

"We've been followin' an old huntin' trail for a while an' I've seen a few old snares." Daryl says, searching Rick's face for a trace of any tenacity being left in the other man. "There's gotta be a cabin close by." He can't be sure, just goes off a hunch, but he needs to convince Rick and apparently it works, because Rick struggles to his feet, leaving a patch of blood behind that looks dark and excessive in the snow.

They do find the cabin, a crappy shack that seems to have been abandoned well before the Turn. Rick stumbles through the door first and Daryl follows, crossbow raised, but unsurprisingly the shack is both human and Walker free

"Home, sweet home." Daryl mumbles and goes to the window even though he knows there's nothing but darkness out there. The cabin is furnished only by a table with two chairs and a bed frame with no mattress. There's nothing they can wrap themselves up in to combat the cold, but at least they can burn the furniture.

Rick watches sceptically as Daryl builds the fire, but he doesn't ask if it's a good idea, knows as well as Daryl that they need one if they want to stay alive. Instead he upholsters his Colt and limps back out the door, comes back with his arms full of firewood.

As soon as the fire is big enough to keep them warm Rick takes off his jacket and begins examining his own injuries. Daryl knows he should be doing the same, but just moves closer to the fire, pretends he's still cold while he watches Rick strip off his shirt. It's dumb, he knows that, but he needs to see for himself that Rick isn't broken beyond repair.

It's the first time he sees the cut in Rick's side since Bob bandaged it and Daryl isn't surprised to see it's healed like shit. Rick never gave it a chance, kept moving around even though Carol tried to keep him still.

If the bruise on Rick's ribs had faded Daryl can't tell now. His whole side is deep red and swollen, looking a lot like Daryl did when he crashed on Merle's bike five years ago. The bruising continues onto his back and Daryl thinks they'll be lucky if there are no internal bleeding and no damage to Rick's kidneys.

"Ya look like a horse threw ya." Daryl says, trying not to let the worry bleed into his voice. Rick looks up and gives him a look that's on the verge of amusement, probably remembering how Daryl had looked when a horse threw him.

The look is gone, though, when Rick turns his attention to the bullet wound in his thigh, unwrapping the knot on the rag he used to bind it. Daryl pulls out the hunting knife they took from the trunk and with a nod from Rick he starts to cautiously cut the tear in the leader's pants bigger to reveal the wound there.

"We need ta cauterize that." Daryl says, knowing that binding it isn't going to do a damn thing to stop the bleeding on an open wound like that. He takes the hunting knife and ties it to a branch before he sticks it in between the burning logs, Rick's eyes on him where ever he moves.

"You're bleeding." Rick says, nodding towards Daryl's hands and Daryl realizes they're red with trails of blood.

"Not much." Daryl shrugs and it's true. He's going to be sore for days and he's pretty sure he has a molar that's a lost cause, but it's nothing compared to how bad it could have ended. But maybe he's the only one of them who finds a comfort in that, at least judging by the look on Rick's face.

"Let me see." Rick says, voice coarse with concern and Daryl only hesitates a few seconds before he sits down in front of Rick. He knows the other man needs this, needs the distraction as much as the knowledge that Daryl isn't bleeding out. So Daryl doesn't stop him when he strips Daryl of his jacket without waiting for permission or when he's pushing Daryl's shirt up his chest rather than unbuttoning it.

It's intimate in a way they've never been before, so unlike the usual clinical check-ups they do to determine the severity of an injury or the hasty brush of hands against skin to assure themselves that a close call had only been that, a close call.

The way Rick touches him now is more like the gentle way Glenn examines Maggie after a run that's gone bad or a hand-to-hand takedown of walkers. Rick lets his fingers run over more than one of Daryl's old scars, on his chest and on his back, but he doesn't linger. He finds the blooming bruises on Daryl's side and the broken ribs that Daryl's been ignoring the best he could, even finds the small cut on Daryl's collarbone, where one of the Reverend's men got a bit too eager with a knife.

" It's nothin'." Daryl says softly, but he's not about to stop Rick, would never dream of it. He allows Rick to dry the blood off with his own plaid shirt, hoping it'll help get that grim expression off Rick's face if he sees there's no harm done. "Yer da one who need stitches."

Rick isn't ready to have his nerves calmed, though, and when he accepts that the blood isn't coming from Daryl's body he grabs for Daryl's wrist instead, pushing the sleeve up to find the marks cut into Daryl's skin by the rope.

"When did they do this?" Rick asks, eyebrows going up.

"They didn't" Daryl says, pulling away from Rick's touch for the first time and he's not even sure why. "Was trying ta get free."

"And you did." Rick says and there's something sad in his voice, but it's warm and Daryl feels the words press their way into his chest like a praise.

"Someone had ta save ya." He says, suppressing the smile, because now isn't the time. Instead he pulls the knife out of the flames and wraps the sleeve of his jacket around the hilt so he can hold it in his hand.

"Grab hold." Daryl says, padding on his own thighs as he makes room for Rick between them. Rick looks like he wants to argue, like he is arguing inside his own head, but in the end he gives in and settles with his back to Daryl. The angle is awkward, because Rick has to bend the wounded leg and twist it so Daryl can get to the wound on the outside of the thigh.

"Trust me." Daryl soothes, because Rick is digging his fingers into the flesh of Daryl's thighs before Daryl has even started. Rick loosen his grip as he leans his head back against Daryl's shoulder to lock his eyes on the cob webs in the ceiling.

With learned precision Daryl presses the hot blade to the wound and Rick gives a deep, croaking scream that hangs in Daryl's ears. To keep himself from tossing Rick reaches back over his shoulder to get a hold, grabbing for anything he can reach and even as Daryl lifts the blade away Rick fists his hand into the hem of Daryl's shirt, reaching for the back of Daryl's neck. Daryl lets him, grounding Rick with a, "Breathe. It's over, just breathe."

He throws the knife on the floor, ignoring the pieces of Rick's skin that sticks to the blade. With a deep breath he wraps an arm around Rick's chest, padding the other man twice where his hand lands.

"Ya did good." Daryl says as much to himself as Rick, waits a few beats before he admits, "This run is ta worst idea ah ever had."

Rick smiles then and it might be the blood loss or maybe just be because they're alive, because they both though they were going to die but instead made it away, both of them relatively unharmed. All the same he looks ridiculous.

* * *

The moment Glenn spots their car turning in on the parking lot he begins to run towards them.

A soon as dawn broke over the woods they had been on their way. They had found a cluster of cars that had been abandoned on the highway and Daryl had picked the baby blue Hyundai, because it reminded him of something safe.

As they get out of the car they are met by calls of concern and hands ready to catch them as if they would crumble now after all they've already struggled through.

The Sargent and Sasha slings a barrage of questions at them, while Carol has too cover her mouth in horror as she sees the state they're in. Carl's wearing the Grimes patented look of anger and concern, but he slings his arms around Rick's chest and when Rick groans in pain Carl just mutters, "Deal with it."

"I'll explain." Rick says when he can catch his breath again, spurring on a new wave of questions that he brushes off with a shake of his head. "Later. First we have to move. The motel isn't safe anymore."

He and Rick had discussed it in the car, discussed the people who had arrived at the cabin and the shots that had been fired. They had weighed the chances of the Reverend still being alive and his ability to follow their car tracks from the Walker-bodies to the motel. They both agreed that if the Reverend was alive he would make finding their group his first priority, maybe even expecting to find it unprotected.

"We could go to Meybeth, the town we checked out yesterday?" Glenn purposes, earning nods from a few of the others, but not from the Sargent or Rosita. "There were people there. Good people."

"We'll discuss it when we've found another place to stay." Rick decides. "I can't make a call right now."

Glenn doesn't argue, knows better by now, and instead he runs to help Maggie down the stairs. It doesn't even take them ten minutes to evacuate the motel, bringing everything of value they can find.

Daryl wants to help, but when he tries to pick up a bundle of blankets his broken ribs sends daggers through his chest. Bob is at his side within seconds, but Daryl just shakes his head and says, "When we're safe."

"Safe from what exactly?" Bob asks, the first to even question Rick's call to move, but Daryl doesn't give him an answer.

Instead he presses a hand to his ribs and looks up at the sky, at the dark clouds forming and feels a rush of relief. There's a storm rolling in and Daryl thinks that if they're lucky the wind and drifting snow will cover their tracks behind them.

* * *

In a small town twenty miles up the road they find a closed street with just a handful of houses, all with fences around their yards. They barricade the road with the cars and snow and pieces of fence they can break off with out causing security holes.

It's a real house, clean and proper. Nothing seems to have been thrashed or looted and they find cans and preserved food in the pantry and a couple of bags of frozen greens in the freezer. They don't open the refrigerator.

They divide themselves in the four bedrooms in the house, the master bedroom going to Maggie with out any debate. Beth moves the crib from the nursery into the room as well and puts her and Judith's stuff there along with Tara, Maggie and Glenn's.

The Sargent takes the teenage-room for himself, Rosita and Eugene and the last room is a pink room with a bed that's too short to fit a grown up, but Carol, Tyreese, Bob and Sasha all move in there on mattresses they scavenge from other houses. Daryl and Michonne takes the nursery for themselves, Rick and Carl, but not until Michonne has cleared out any trace of baby toys.

When Bob finally gets permission to look the two of them over they're all gathered in the living room, listening to Rick explaining everything that went down after they arrived at the bodies Daryl and Glenn had found. He cleans Daryl's wrists with soft hands and even though he doesn't say anything Daryl can see the medic knows the determination it took Daryl to inflict injuries like that on himself. When he finds the broken ribs he sighs and shakes his head.

"I should tie you to your bed for a week." He says, ripping a crisp, white sheet from the cupboard into strips and pushes Daryl's arms in the air so he can bind his chest tightly. "But you'd probably just break the bed to get up." He teases with a crooked smile. Daryl just snorts.

When Bob is finished with Daryl Glenn is speaking, so when Bob turns on Rick the leader submits to the examinations without fussing.

"They were about 20 grown-ups and a handful of children." Glenn says, turning his eyes to Daryl as Rick strips down to his underwear. "They were set up like we are now, in a few guarded houses, fences and barricades to keep the walkers out."

"Heavy weapons?" Daryl asks, because big guns make noise and are often more effective against the living than the dead.

Glenn shakes his head. "But they did have some pretty genius alarms." He says and goes on to explain how they had rigged walker traps to baby alarms, but Daryl zones out, instead looking to Rick who is currently exchanging a few hushed words with Bob about the cauterized wound on his thigh.

"I'm sure these people were sweet folks." The Sargent says as soon as Glenn breaks for air. "But I think we have enough people and we sure as hell don't need more children, no offense Maggie."

"I was thinking we could stay there for a little while." Glenn says and his tone is not with out authority. "We need a place for Maggie to have the baby, a place that's safe."

"There aren't any Walkers out there." The Sargent says, "You said that yourself."

"But there's him." Glenn says, looking at Rick for support. "If he's out there looking for us? I don't want to take that risk when Maggie can't run or fight."

"He can't find us here, even if he is alive." The Sargent says and that's when Daryl realizes that the Sargent isn't against staying low for awhile while Maggie has the baby. He's a reasonable man and despite Rick's fears Daryl doesn't think the Sargent is willing to split the group apart. He just doesn't want to go to a town where they'll risk more problems, risk having more people depend on them and delay their journey once the snow starts melting. New people will either mean trouble or distractions at best.

"He tracked us down this time!" Glenn says loudly, looking as if he's about to continue when Rick cuts him off.

"He didn't track us, he knows where we're going." Rick says, winching when Bob tightens the bandage around his ribs.

"He can't know that." The Sargent protests, eyes finding Rosita who thunders back at him, "I didn't tell him a damn thing!"

"It doesn't matter, he knows." Rick insists.

"He left them Walkers as a sign ta us, to get our attention. We walked right at him." Daryl agrees, leaning back against the wall as they all turn their eyes on him. "He's bat-crazy an' he ain't stoppin' 'till he kills Rick."

"Why Rick?" Tyreese asks, reminding Daryl that he and Carol hadn't been with the group at that point.

"He thinks Rick is the a demon." Glenn says when no one else speaks up. "Before we found out he was holding Beth and that he was the one who'd kidnapped Rosita we talked to him. He seemed like a nice guy."

They always do, Daryl thinks, but he doesn't say it out loud, instead mumbling, "Crazy sumbitch."

"We told him what we'd been through, told him about the Governor and Woodsbury, about Terminus." Glenn continues. "And somehow, in his mind, Rick became some kind of destroyer."

"Didn't help when Rick found Beth and Rosita." The Sargent says. "And those two brainwashed girls he'd been keeping in the church."

Daryl hardly has time to register that Beth has scrambled to her feet, just watches as she runs from the room, tears down her face, but Tara follows her instantly. Maggie asks Glenn to pull her out of the couch and she follows her sister with a look of pained determination on her face.

"What happened to the other girls?" Carol asks, eyes still lingering on the staircase where Beth had disappeared.

"They stayed with him." Rosita says and there's a hard edge to her voice. "He had their heads twisted, Beth's too, I think." She stops and closes her eyes. "If anyone is a demon it's him."

"So he wants to kill Rick." Tyreese summarize. "Because he thinks Rick is a cold-blooded killer demon who destroys cities and took his toys away?" He says it in a tone that's meant to make the words ridiculous, but the thing is Daryl is very aware of the lost look in his leader's eyes. Rick thinks the Reverend is right and the wrongness of that, of Rick even allowing himself to go there, is making Daryl's throat tie up. And on top of that a few of them even have the nerves to look at Rick for a reaction.

"You're not a monster." Michonne says, the first one to read the look on Rick's face as well as Daryl had, and maybe it's because she reads people so well, or maybe it's because she's had to tell herself the same thing more than once. "We've all had to do things to stay alive. To keep people alive."

"Rick." Tyreese says, voice heavy. "You remember back in the prison, after Karen and David?" He looks to Carol and Daryl isn't sure when she'd told Tyreese what she had done, just that it had happened before the two of them rejoined their group. "I was being erratic and you knocked me on my ass."

Rick nods, eyes going dark. "And then some."

"And then after, you were so busy keeping everyone alive, keeping the prison going. Felt like you didn't care about finding out who'd done it. Felt like you didn't care about justice at all."

Rick looks like he's fighting himself not to buckle, not to run away, not to yell, not to give up. "I remember." He says, not even trying to defend himself.

"It took me a while." Tyreese says. "It took me forgiving Carol for what she'd done. Took me seeing what was left of Terminus, what you were willing to do." He sags in on himself. "This world ain't about what's good and what's bad. Not anymore. It's about what's right. It's about that wire you have to walk between good and bad to keep your friends alive."

Rick doesn't look convinced, but it's not until the four of them are settling in their room that Daryl continues the conversation. He hadn't wanted to do it in front of everyone, but now there's just the four of them and he doesn't want to have this conversation twice, decides it's better to end this now.

"It ain't about loosin' yerself, Rick." He says even though Rick is sitting with his back to them on the bed. "It's about adaptin'."

Rick turns his head and looks at Daryl over his shoulder, eyes big in the low light from the few candles they had been able to scavenge from the surrounding houses.

"Remember when ya gave Carl his gun back? That wasn't because ya gave up on 'im. That was because ya accepted that he needed it. Ya made yer peace with the fact that it just ain't the same world." He knows he's pushing the line, but this needs saying. For Rick's ears as much as for Carl's. "Carl looks ta his father.. Ya see yerself as a monster and Carl thinks that makes him one, too. Truth is yer both just willin' ta do what needs doing. We all do what we have to do to protect the people we love." Daryl finishes and like the coward he is he slips out of the room and leaves Rick to let the words sink in, leaves Michonne to mother the hurt look off Carl's face.

He crawls out of a window and sits on the snow-cowered roof until he's freezing, but a fist full of snow feels great against his lip, which he hadn't even realized had been split until Bob offered to clean it and give it butterfly tape. If Bob knew Daryl was sitting on a roof instead of nursing his broken ribs he'd probably make good on his threat to tie Daryl to a bed, so when he crawls back inside he tries his best to be quiet, slipping back into the darkness of their room and closing the door behind him as carefully as he can.

Carl is using Michonne's stomach as a pillow, his body angled away from hers in a way that takes up far too much of the mattresses they have pushed together on the floor. He considers joining them in a pile when he sees the dark figure of Rick, perching on the window still.

"Yer sitting here waiting fer me like a creeper?" Daryl asks quietly, knowing that at least Rick won't raise his voice at him when Carl is asleep.

"Maybe." Rick says and Daryl feels his heart leap, because Rick doesn't sound angry. "Maybe I just didn't want to sleep with out knowing you were safe."

"Yer ridiculous." Daryl finds himself saying as he strips his jacket off and ducks under the covers. It takes a while for Rick to join him in the bed and when he does it's hesitantly, as if he's not sure if Daryl wants him there. "You Grimes' might sooner die of worryin' than anythin' else. If ya were the man the Reverend claimed ya ta be, you think these people would still be here, followin' ya?" Daryl asks when Rick settles under the covers with a muffled hiss of pain. "We're all still here, ain't we?"

"You are." Rick agrees and there's a light graze of fingers over the bandages around Daryl's wrist and he doesn't need to turn his head to know that Rick is looking at him. "You are."

Turns out the clouds coming in had been full of snow and every trace of their movements are deleted come morning.

That's when Maggie's water breaks.

* * *

Carol and Sasha are in Maggie's room all day and the rest of them stay inside, listening to her screams. Daryl and Rick has been placed on each their couch, pumped up on painkillers while Tyreese has taken Lil'Asskicker. The two of them have bonded while they were on the road and when Judith gets mad and starts to fuss Tyreese takes her and presses her to his chest and sings her Don't Take the Girl.

Daryl drifts in and out of sleep and at noon he can feel the pain returning, but rather than asking for more of their precious painkillers he distracts himself by watching Carl, Beth and Tara playing monopoly on the floor.

"You can't do that," Tara complains as Carl demands to buy all her hotels. "Haven't you ever played this game before?"

"I was twelve when the world ended." Carl says as if that explains everything, but Tara just laughs.

"When I was twelve I was already out kissing girls." She says with a sly smile. "If you don't know the rules to monopoly your dad needs a spanking."

"Promise?" Rick deadpans, making Tara blush for the first time ever and they all laugh, except Beth who still wore a look that was near unbearable.

Tara notice too, reaches over to take Beth's hand and gives it a squeeze. Beth looks up and her Disney eyes finds Tara's with a shy smile that's so precious that Daryl wants to give Tara the "if you ever break her heart I swear to God"-speech right then and there, because if anyone deserves to be happy it's Beth.

Daryl remembers right after they left the Farm, remembers how broken the girl had been. Within the span of a few weeks she had lost her mother, her reserve-mother, her boyfriend and her home. Daryl knew she had been in a bad state for a few days after they shoot the Walkers in the barn, but after the farm was overrun no one had time to hold her hand. Even though Lori tried she had her own problems with Rick and Maggie was busy keeping Hershel from going under.

Daryl never knew why he took it upon himself to pull her back. Maybe it was because he overheard Lori worrying to Carol about the girl trying to take her own life again. Hell, Daryl wasn't a headshrinker, but he knew damn well how dark it could get, how easy it could seem to end it all. But Daryl had been stronger than that and he'd made Andrea realize that she was stronger too. He'd be damned if he couldn't make a self-centered teen realize the same thing.

One afternoon they were camped out next to a shallow lake and the group felt safe enough to do things like bathing and washing their clothes and Maggie and Glenn felt safe enough to sneak off into the words near by, Beth's eyes following them as the disappeared.

"'Least they're being discreet about it," Daryl had commented quietly, holding the arrow he was making up to his eye to evaluate if it needed any corrections. When he had glanced back at her, she was looking caught out and flushed.

"It's not any of my business, just..." She trailed off, like there really wasn't supposed to be anything at the end of that sentence.

"Jus' what?"

"Must be nice." She had finally said, eyes still not meeting Daryl's.

"They'll just get their asses bit by mosquitoes."

"Not that. Not the sex, I mean." She had blushed even more. "Just, the world is ending and all they care about is taking all the pleasure they can get while they have the chance. Guess I'm just too afraid to let anyone new in, you know?"

"Yer will someday" Daryl had said, realizing that her sadness wasn't for the ones she'd lost, but for the ones she feared she'd never get. "Yer sister found Glenn, didn't she?"

She'd looked stubborn then and stubborn was good. Stubborn was one step away from being strong.

"Maybe you could find someone too," She had raised her baby blues to stare him down. "If you ever bothered with the people who care about you." It had barely been more than a whisper, buy it had hit Daryl like a punch in the guts.

* * *

It's getting dark outside when Maggie's screams stop and another, much higher-pitched scream starts.

They all stop what ever they're doing, except Judith who begins to cry in sympathy. Daryl struggles to his feet and drifts towards the door, just as Glenn walks through it, the biggest grin on his face.

"I'm a dad." Glenn whispers. "I'm a baby daddy."

Daryl opens his arms and Glenn walks right into him, letting Daryl cup the back of his head and spin him half a circle before he has to give up, placing a soft kiss on Glenn's hair instead. There's pain all over his body, but Daryl thinks it worth it because their family just got bigger.

"Congrats man." He says, looking over Glenn's head to see Michonne resting her head on Rick's shoulder, Carl at her side in a one-armed hug.

"It's a boy." Glenn says, as if he's just now remembering that the gender is a thing people want to know, too.

"Can we see him?" Beth says, light on her face like Daryl hasn't seen it since the prison.

"Yeah, Yes. Please come meet my son." Glenn says and he leads the way into the master bedroom, where Maggie is resting with a bundle on her chest. She looks absolutely worn out, but she still has a soft smile on her face, eyes glued to the miracle she's spend nine months growing in her belly.

"Can we name him Herschel?" Maggie asks and there's a moment of silence where they all feel a tug of pain.

"No." Glenn says and it's enough to take the smile off Maggie's face, but he continues quickly. "Look, I know the world is ending and I know you want something to hold on to. I want you to have that, I do. But I still think that babies should have their own name, not the name of someone who's dead. So I was thinking we could name him Seamus, because that's the only Irish boys name I know."

"That..." Maggie frowns. "Actually makes sense. It's dumb, but it makes sense." And then her frown splits into a wide smile. "How about that baby boy?" She coos. "Do you want to be named Seamus?"

Daryl feels the hand on his shoulder and he doesn't have to turn his head to know it's Rick's, to know that when he backs up a step Rick is right there. With a smile on his face his own hand comes up to cover Rick's, ignoring the way his wrist hurts when he squeezes the other man's hand.


	4. Pit Stop

For the most part Rick is very good at reading people. He instantly knows who he can rely on, who's a liability or who's a threat.

So Daryl isn't surprised it took Rick a while to trust him.

It took about as long as it took Daryl to figure out that he wasn't going to leave, that he belonged with the group for better or worse, what ever the hell that meant. Once Daryl had made that call and made peace with his new crew Rick loosened the reins on him, deliberately turning his unprotected back to Daryl in a show of trust and friendship, even asking for his advice.

Daryl might not be an angel, but he was loyal, had always been. Daryl knew when to shut his mouth and follow orders, but he also knew when to speak up or carry the burden of being the executioner and Rick had seen that, seen the quality in that.

That being said there are some things Rick just don't see. Daryl considers them blind spots and while some of them are clearly lack of experience others are intentional disregard.

Like Shane, who had been a risk to the safety of the group at best, at worst a direct threat. Daryl knew the instant Shane hadn't volunteered to follow Rick back to get Merle. He'd been willing to let Rick alone with Daryl, maybe hoping that Daryl would be pissed enough to finish Rick off so Shane could go back to banging Rick's wife, but Rick hadn't wanted to see what was happening. It isn't until he takes Shane's place by Rick's side that Daryl realizes that this particular blind spot transfers directly onto what ever person Rick considers his wingman.

Daryl assumes it's probably something that's been drilled into Rick as a cop, to trust the man next to you, but Daryl had never expected to have a man like Rick trust him blindly.

Unlike Carl, Daryl has effectively been cured of all dumb illusion of heroes or the greatness in man or any damn thing like that. Humans are flawed and some are broken and Daryl knows first hand that some are shattered beyond repair or redemption. That being said Rick is as close to a good man as Daryl has ever seen, even with all his starry-eyed moral and small town do-good attitude that Daryl wanted nothing better than to beat out of him first day they met.

Rick didn't make promises or try to sway the rest of them into following him. He told them how it was going to be and to the rest of the group's plain surprise Daryl found himself agreeing to Rick's terms without hesitation, even when the rest of them were still weighing Rick's actions and words into piles of pros and cons.

The two of them quickly developed a range of signals to help them communicate during hunts and most times even something as simple as a shared look was enough to bring the other person up to speed on a plan or dissuade an idea. Sometime during that first winter their battle-forged bond was replaced by an actual friendship and the group settled around them.

Rick was by nature and nurture a tactile man, but he understood that he was the leader of a skittish group of people who didn't trust him entirely and as a result the way he handled everyone in the group, from a pad on the back to a hand helping someone up from the floor, was careful and deliberate.

It was different with Daryl. Despite the fact that Daryl had accepted Rick as a leader much faster than the rest of them Rick had been less inclined to touch Daryl at first. He couldn't tell if the leader was still scared that Daryl would try to bite his hand or if it was because the wound from Shane was still too deep, but when Rick finally crossed the chasm it was easy and spontaneous, Rick padding his shoulder as a good job for killing a walker. Maybe Daryl should have been ready for it, but he'd damn near stopped in his tracks.

After that he forced himself not to recoil from the hand that came up to cup the back of his head like the most natural thing in the world, Rick's smile wide and giddy, because Daryl's arrow took down a deer after a week of the group starving. He never commented on Rick's teasing finger that poked Daryl's side when Carol, twinkle in her eye, noted how Daryl had lost all his `baby-fat´. And truth be told, if anyone but Rick had leaned in and blown softly into his ear because he'd dosed off during a tactical meeting he might very well have punched them.

But to Rick physical contact between two alpha males is a sign of trust, something that had been made clear by the way he withdrew from Shane towards the end, so Daryl fought to push past his own damage and returned the touches as best as he could.

It started as a gentle squeeze of Rick's shoulder when they had set up camp for the night and a tap on the side of Rick's thigh to get his attention during a hunt. Just a reassuring pressure of hands that much later turned into a tap of something soft and intimate when Daryl headed out on a run and Rick stayed home.

It's in Rick's nature to accept it as a strengthening of their bond and Daryl allows himself to pour more into it than should rightfully be there and it's such a close mimic of Rick's own touches that the leader never realizes that they're so much more.

The only line Daryl never breaks, even if Rick doesn't show the same restrains, is the personal space barrier.

Not until he does.

Not until one night he commands Rick outside in the snow and darkness and puts his arms around the leader until the other man breaks against Daryl's sharp edges and surrenders in a way that Daryl is pretty sure he never asked for. Not that he minds in the slightest.

Rick had damn near squeezed the life out of Daryl, but he didn't push Rick away, would never. Because Daryl might not believe in heroes, but he doesn't mind supporting one.

Which is why he's once again standing at Rick's side as the leaders of the Meybeth Community comes out to meet them

"Your man said you'd been on the road for a while." A short Texan woman says, nodding towards Glenn who's at Rick's other side. Glenn had introduced her as Joan and while she seems like a sweet old woman Daryl knows you don't get to speak for a town by being sweet. "But ya don't look like people who's been on the run."

"We've been travelling, not running." Rick says with a court nod, hands at the hips like the cop he is, because apparently old habits die harder than humanity. Michonne, Sasha and Beth are making up the rest of the delegation, carefully selected to be able to back Rick if needed while looking sufficiently endearing.

"Most people lay low in the winter if they can help it." The man next to Joan says. He had introduced himself as Richard, giving out firm handshakes and an extra glance at Michonne's sword.

"Well, we're a strong group." Rick deflects. The Sargent had demanded that they wouldn't mention Eugene and their mission, had made it as a condition for letting them go. "We only stopped because Glenn's wife had a baby and we've had a couple of people who weren't fit for travel."

That was putting it mildly. Bob had barely agreed to let Daryl and Rick out of the house for this meeting and only after re-binding their ribs so tightly Daryl had difficulties breathing. Not that Daryl had given him or Rick much choice. He'd been going stir crazy in the house, snapping at Carl and Carol and when not even Judith could trigger a smile he had threatened to go hunt. Rick had suggested this instead, maybe because he knew Daryl still had stabbing pains when he tried loading his crossbow.

"Sounds like you've had some ups and downs then," Joan says with a cautious smile. "We just had a baby two months ago, a young girl who was part of a group that joined us. Such a blessing in these times."

"You seem to be doing all right for yourself," The last of the Meybeth leaders says, a young man named Jeree with dark skin and a scar across one side of his face. "I'm guessing you're not looking to join us here?"

"And you'd be right." Rick says, looking to Daryl while he considers his next words. "We're not looking for shelter. As soon as the weather allows it we're moving on."

"So what are you looking for?" Richard asks, shifting nervously and Daryl recognizes the face of a man who's praying that the answer isn't going to be Trouble.

"We've had problems before." Sasha says calmly, meeting each of the Meybeth leader's eyes in turn. "We've never sought out a fight, but we've learned that people can be very protective of their area. We just wanted to make sure you didn't feel threatened."

"Look, we're not going to chase you out of town guns blazing. You know as well as us that we don't have the manpower or the weaponry for that. We rely on our security systems and the natural cover of this area to stay safe. If you're not looking to take our town then we have no quarrel with you folks."

"We appreciate that, ma'm." Rick says, hand halfway up to tip a hat that isn't there, before remembering he isn't a small town sheriff deputy settling a dispute. "We won't be in your way."

"I can't say strangers doesn't make us nervous." Richard says. "There's been some odd sightings lately. Our Scavengers reporting about undeads spiked to the ground by crosses, messages written in blood in the snow."

Daryl feels the rest of his group react to the information, silently cursing at them and their lousy acting skills, but Glenn smooths it over by saying, "We've seen that too. People in our group wanted to move on, but then Maggie's water broke." He lies without a beat and Sasha backs it up with a nod.

"Yes, it's disturbing stuff." Joan agrees, looking to Richard. "A week ago our scavengers found a Priest who had been held captive in the woods."

This time Daryl is the one to react, hand coming up to his crossbow before he can stop himself, but Rick reaches backwards for him, hand landing on Daryl's stomach, fingers digging in to ground him.

"This a black priest?" Daryl asks, well aware that all pretences of tact just hit the floor screaming.

Joan looks from Daryl to Sasha and Michonne, probably weighing Daryl's redneck dialect against his companions, apparently deciding that Daryl's choice of words came from his upbringing rather than an actual bigoted mindset.

"Dark-skinned, yes." She corrects stubbornly. "And traumatized."

"I'm not gonna tell you how to run your camp," Rick warns, "But this man is bad news. He twists the mind of good people."

"You have to kill him!" Beth interrupts suddenly and Daryl can feel his own anger ebbing out when he sees the panic in her face. "He's a monster and you have to kill him now!"

"Calm down, Beth" Sasha says while she reaches for the blond girl, but Beth pushes past her and gets in Joan's face, standing just a few inches taller than the short woman. "He's a monster," She repeats, voice steal and eyes flaming. "And if you don't kill him he will make you all wish you were dead!"

It's not the first time Beth talks like this, not the first time Daryl is forced to face the hell she had gone through because Daryl failed to keep her safe, but this time he isn't ready for it and he has to look away from her pained face.

The Meybeth leaders are backing away, anger, confusion and surprise represented on each their faces. It's Richard that speaks up. "Look., I don't know what your history is with this priest, but he's been through a terrible ordeal. What ever he's done I can promise you, he's more than paid for it."

"The hell he has." Daryl growls, ready to force his way into the town, but Rick is holding him back with a hand on his chest and pleading, blue eyes. Daryl forces himself to calm down, instead pacing behind the rest of them to clear his head, to avoid looking at Beth, who's slowly starting to panic. Sasha is the one who finally pulls Beth close and whispers into her hair until Beth goes limp in her arms

"Whatever this man has told you," Rick is telling the Meybeth leaders, "However convincing he sounds, I can promise you he is manipulating you."

"And I can promise you, Mister Grimes, I am not that easily manipulated." Joan says, meeting Rick's eyes, meeting stubbornness with stubbornness. "I was against the death penalty before the Turn and my view hasn't been changed by half of the world's population dying."

* * *

"I wanna go at 'im," Daryl says, pushing past Rick into the darkness of the kitchen. "Sumbitch keeps slippin' through my fingers, ah ain't makin' the same mistake again."

"Slow down." Rick warns, following Daryl out of the living room, away from the rest of their group who went silent as soon as Daryl and Rick started arguing again.

"He took Beth right outa ma hands," Daryl thunders back at Rick, the redneck coming into his speech at full force. "It was ma job ta protect 'er an' ah failed 'er:"

"Daryl!" The amount of force Rick's willing to use to pull Daryl back and slam him against a wall catches the hunter by surprise, maybe because he wasn't expecting Rick to get physical at all, but once his back is against the wall he doesn't fight to get loose. Rick's eyes are a snow storm, but Daryl returns his stare, hands in white-knuckled fists at his side.

"Daryl, you can't." Rick says, whisper-soft and maddening close. "He's under the protection of good people. We can't afford to get on their bad side."

"Ah know. 'S why ah'll go alone."

"And if anyone gets in your way?" Rick demands. "You told me once "this isn't us.". Now I'm telling you, Daryl. These are good people. You're a good man."

"You're a good man". Daryl says defensively, making the compliment into an accusation. "You've done worse. So 'ave I. You know as well as me that he'll turn that whole town on us. The way he looked at you..." Daryl cuts the sentence short, suddenly aware that everyone in the next room can hear every word they're saying. Lowering his voice he adds, "You'd do the same ta protect the people you love."

"Which is exactly why I can't let you do what you're asking to do. You're too important to me." Rick says with out missing a beat, taking Daryl completely off guard. The look on Rick's face reads like a challenge and for a second Daryl is tempted to rise to it. He'd accepted at some point after his and Merle's return to the prison that he was willing to surrender to Rick, but not like this, not in a game of chicken.

"If ya tell me ta stay I'll stay." He says instead, seeing the weight of his words on their leader. Sharp blue eyes searches Daryl's face and Daryl isn't sure what Rick's looking for, not sure if he finds it either.

"You're not done healing." Is Rick's non-reply that ends the argument. When he walks away from Daryl the hunter slides to the floor, hiding his face in the safety of his arms and knees.

* * *

Ever since Rick and Daryl returned with the news that the Reverend had followed them Beth's occasional nightmares had become a nightly affair. During the days she tends to zone out, her fingers absently finding Judith's stuffed toy, the one she keeps in her back pocket, but other times she squeezes the green plush frog so hard Daryl's sure she uses it to ground herself, to remind herself she's back with them and safe. It doesn't help keep the nightmares away, though, and every night they're all roused by Beth screaming in full blown panic, leaving Tara to calm her and Maggie and Glenn to calm Seamus and Judith when they start crying.

None of them have gotten a full night's sleep in a week, no one except Rosita at least. Daryl has seen her stay up two nights in a row with out as much as a yawn, but as soon as her head is vertical she's gone and not even Eugene's snoring can wake her. So when Daryl goes to relieve Glenn from his watch, he's not surprised to find Rosita on watch instead, quilt spread out on the sloping roof of the adjacent garage.

He sits down next to her, laying his unfinished arrows on the quilt between them and taking out his knife.

"Getting ready for a war?" She asks, side-eying his arsenal-in-the-making.

"Somethin' like that." Daryl says, but it's not entirely true. Rick's made the call to stay away from Meybeth and Daryl's done arguing. Hell, he knows Rick's made the right call, so it isn't even about doing as he's told. But Daryl's realistic, knows the Reverend is going to follow them to the ends of the earth or until Rick is dead and Daryl's going to be ready for him.

"I wanna kill him too, you know." Rosita says. "Probably more than you do, but that's not the mission."

"I don't give half a shit about the mission. Just goes where Rick leads, that's it. Ah sure as hell isn't going ta walk over the corpses of my friends te get it done."

"Unlike Abraham, you mean?" She asks, looking up at him. "He was ready to leave me behind, wasn't he? When the Reverend took me."

"We all were." Daryl admits shrugging, because Rosita had been no one to Daryl at that point and he's not going to feel bad about wanting to leave her behind. There's plenty of other things to feel bad about. "Tara was the only one who spoke against."

"That girl's got a mouth on her."

"Managed to sway Rick. Not many people can." He draws the blade of his knife gently over the side of the arrow, correcting the last bit of unevenness before he begins fitting the fletchings to one end.

"You do it all the time. Just a look from you and he bows." She argues, dragging a snort out of Daryl.

"Man, that's different. Rick trusts me. Trusts me ta tell him if he's wrong, too. You can't have a man's back if you're too busy lickin' his ass."

"You think I lick Abe's ass?" Rosita asks, frown deep and the corners of her pretty mouth dragging down in a sneer.

Daryl lets her draw her own conclusions on that, instead saying, "I know ya love 'im. I get that. Everyone in this group's ready to tear themselves apart ta save the ones they love."

She must read something in Daryl's words, because her face goes suddenly soft. "He loves you too, you know." She says, taking Daryl by surprise. "Rick, I mean."

"'Cause he does. We're family." He dodges.

"That's not what I meant."

"Ah know what ya meant." Daryl mutters, eyes flint against Rosita's brown doe-eyes. "Was givin' ya a chance ta realize it ain't none of yer business, but then ya had ta be dumb about it."

She has the decency to hide her damn smirk as she gets to her feet and dismisses herself with a light touch of her hand against his shoulder and a, "Come get me if you feel tired."

It takes less than ten minutes for Michonne to join him and he's not sure if she's talked to Rosita or if she'd known where to look for him, but she doesn't seem the least bit surprised to find him out here. He spreads one side of the quilt out and she sits down next to him, shoulder pressing against his.

"You're moping." She informs him, brown eyes giving apologies, probably for having the nerve to call him on his mood. "It's all over your face."

"Ma face always looks like this." Daryl says and Michonne just shrugs.

"Didn't say it was a new development." she says smiling. "What's wrong?"

"S'nothin'" Daryl says, but Michonne isn't buying it, never have.

"Look, Daryl. The last time there was a man who wanted us dead I gave up on finding him and it cost us our home. But chasing after him almost cost me something much more important."

"That's really unhelpful."

"What do you want, Daryl?"

Rick, Daryl's unhelpful mind answers. He wants Rick, wants his time and his attention. Wants a whole bunch of other things that he can't even put words on. He's just never stopped to think about what that means, knows he wouldn't be able to stop if he started. He'd go crazy thinking about it. Ways that it could go wrong. Ways it could go right, and shit, that is probably even more terrifying.

Truth is, even if Daryl got what he wanted he wouldn't know what to do with it.

"I want people ta stop bugging me with questions I don't know the damn answer to." he says, surprising himself with the honestly. He's even more surprised when Michonne laughs at him.

"What's so funny?" He demands.

"Just that Rick said the same thing, only I think his exact words were, "You're not my damn mother!"

"You talk to him?"

"Yes. At least he's smart enough to mope around inside where it's warm."

"I had stuff." Daryl says, not actually wanting to explain why he's sitting out in the cold like an evicted house cat.

"I know." She answers and when the silence falls between them it's calm and comforting.

* * *

His ribs still hurt, probably will for another full week, but Daryl can't lie still on a couch. Instead he sneaks away to work on his own project, stubbornly avoiding people who's company he actually craves.

Daryl works the pelts soft with his hands, stretching and rubbing the underside until he's satisfied. With his knife he cuts each pelt into strips and works the tip of the knife through to make little holes along the sides. Carol gives him the string with out asking questions and he stitches the strips of pelt together in patterns of white, gray and brown. He takes his sweet time, not rushing a single part of it, instead enjoying the work, the distraction and the feel of silky fur against his palms.

The result is pretty, his careful handiwork making the fur-side blend easily between the different pieces. He ends with two blankets, one a patchwork of darker colors with a border of white and the second one mainly white and light gray with ermine tails decorating each corner, as white and black-tipped tassels.

Maggie is seated in one of the couches in the living room, eyes bright, cheeks rosy and the baby fitting snugly into the cradle of her arms like he grew there instead of inside her body. She's always been good with Judith, even if she only ever held her when Beth was mixing formula or Carol had to get the water just right for Lil'Asskicker's bath, but she looks different with her own baby, content in a way that makes Daryl's chest clench. Glenn is napping in the armchair, has probably been up during the night to pace the room with both babies in the aftermath of Beth's nightmares.

There are several eyes on him the moment he enters the living room, people who have wondered where he's been all day, but Rick's eyes are the only one he seeks out before he perches on the armrest of the couch next to Maggie, presenting her with the darkest of the two blankets.

"I made this." He says, trying to fight the nervousness he feels at actually handing the blanket over. "Fer the baby."

Maggie looks surprised more than anything, but it slowly turns into a genuine and amazed smile.

"This is beautiful, Daryl." She says, not taking the rabbit blanket from him, but instead running a hand over it while he still holds it out to her. Seamus stirs in her arms and Glenn stirs in his chair. "This must have taken weeks to gather."

"Months actually." Daryl says, glad that she didn't focus on the fact that he's been hiding away all day to make it. "Started as soon as you told everyone 'bout the baby. The brown furs are from Georgia. Figured he should have something from home, even if he's too young to care 'bout stuff like that."

She doesn't answer, her big, gray eyes locked on his face until he has to look away and they both end up looking down at the blanket in Daryl's hands. When she takes it from him her hand grasps his, wide smile finally managing to draw an uncertain smile out of him in return. "Thank you Daryl. You don't know how much this means."

He nods with a smile and slides off the armrest to his feet, walking over to sit next to Rick on the other couch. The leader makes room for him, but once he's settled Rick leans back in until they are pressed together closer than they need to be. It's comfortable and comforting and Rick's hand finds his knee, gives it a gentle squeeze.

"Glad to see you can keep busy." He says softly. "I've been going crazy on this couch with nothing to take my mind off the pain."

Daryl's not sure if he reads more into the words than he should, so he decides not to comment on them, instead saying, "Ah also made one fer Judy."

The look Rick gives him then is so soft and affectionate, that Daryl knows he isn't imagining this, isn't imagining the way Rick's fingers dig in a little deeper around his knee before letting go and clenching into a fist, as if Rick is fighting to keep himself from touching Daryl.

Daryl can't keep the smirk from his face, doesn't care if Rick sees it.

* * *

Carl and Michonne takes the night watch together that night and Daryl isn't sure if it's on Rick's orders or Michonne's initiative, but either way Daryl has a hard time finding the confidence to walk into their room that evening.

Rick is standing with his back to the door, Judy in his arms, bouncing her gently as his body sways lightly. If Daryl was ever going to apply the term graceful to a man, it would be Rick and Daryl sometimes catches himself staring when Rick moves, slim shoulders and narrow hips making him seem more fragile than he is.

Suddenly Daryl is grateful for the toddler's presence. As long as she's in the room, safely held against Rick's shoulder Daryl can keep his head clean, but it's not until Rick turns and looks at him that Daryl realizes that Rick is holding the toddler for that same reason.

"Ah wanted to make something pretty for 'er." Daryl says and Rick's eyes follow him as he walks to his backpack and takes out the white rabbit blanket. "Little girls like princess things, but she's gonna grow up ta be a warrior princess. I don't know, this seemed appropriate"

Rick takes his eyes from Daryl's face and looks at the blanket. He takes in the quality of the work and the smile that finds his face is all the praise Daryl needs.

"This is beautiful work. I didn't know you could sow." The smile is teasing and his eyes goes momentarily to the tears in Daryl's pants.

Daryl snorts. "Not too different from stitchin' people up." He counters and the smile on Rick's face widens.

Daryl spreads the blanket out on the bed and Rick lowers Judith down, putting her on her back on the soft fur with out waking her. They stand side by side, watching her sleep for a stretch of time and Daryl doesn't bother to school the affection off his face. It's not until he becomes aware that Rick is watching him that Daryl realizes that he might have screwed up a bit, because there is no longer a sleeping toddler in Rick's arms and nothing to anchor Daryl's wandering mind.

"Michonne took the watch." Rick says, clearing that up. "She though we needed to talk."

"She thinks a lot of things." Daryl says, not sure why he gets defensive when he's the one who walked into the room to begin with., but Rick isn't discouraged. Instead he moves closer into Daryl's personal space and for some reason the invasion doesn't seem so threatening.

"Maybe she's right." Rick says, looking down at Judith and Daryl finds his eyes transfixed by the tendons and muscle that runs from Rick's jaw to his shoulder, suddenly clear by the angle of his head. "I'm pretty good at reading people, but for some reason I'm having trouble reading you."

"Maybe 'cause I'm a lot simpler than you give me credit for." Daryl mutters, earning a soft huff of amusement from Rick who turns his head again, eyes finding Daryl's in the dim light.

"Look, Daryl. I don't know what you're thinking." Rick presses and then waits for an answer, but Daryl isn't ready to give one so Rick continues. "You always have my back. Even when you disagree. I trust you with the life of this group, with the life of my children. You're my best friend and I don't know what that means to you, but you gotta trust that it means everything to me. If you doubt that..."

"Ain't about that." Daryl says as a mix of endorphins and adrenalin floods his body. "An' I know what yer thinking, but I ain't scared. Guess I just aren't sure what I want."

"Do you want this?" Rick asks, hand coming up to cup Daryl's jaw and Daryl has to close his eyes when a surge of fire burns through his blood and meets the spike of ice that shoots up his spine.

All he can do is nod and swallow as Rick runs the fingertips of his other hand up through the strains of hair on the outside of Daryl's arm, a simple touch that has Daryl trembling against his will. He didn't realize a body could be so starved for physical attention, but he feels every point of connection and he almost bolts backwards, but then Rick has closed the gap between their mouths and Daryl is drowning.

His lips are moving on instinct, responding to Ricks pressure with a burning need that turns into aggression when Rick's hands both falls to grab at Daryl's hipbones. Daryl follows Rick's lead, like he always does and Rick seems happy to take Daryl apart.

"How long have you been holding that back" Rick asks when Daryl allows him the use of his mouth.

"Ya don't wanna know." Daryl growls as he remembers the first time he realized he was in love with Rick, that his world was build on Rick's shoulders. "Never was gonna act on it."

"No, I figured as much." Rick says, smile almost apologetic. "Like I said, you're not easy for me to read, but I finally realized you were never gonna make the first move."

"How 'bout ah make the second?" Daryl offers, pushing Rick back against the wall, because he's finally allowed to. Rick's fingers are in his hair as soon as their mouth clashes together, pulling Daryl in with a force. Daryl is the first to risk slipping his hands under Rick's shirt, fingers exploring skin in a way that wasn't the least bit clinical or hesitant, but the the soft babbling sounds of Judith brings them back. Daryl smiles and ducks his head into the warm skin of Rick's neck, exhaling forcefully as the reality of what is going on hits him. Rick's hands stay in Daryl's hair and are joined by his lips.

"Guess that makes us equal." Rick mumbles into Daryl's hair.

Daryl kisses the curve of Rick's neck. "Makes us somethin'." He says and as vague as it is Daryl feels it's pretty damn accurate.

He's not sure when he falls asleep, when Rick falls asleep, but the last thing he remembers is how well Rick's fingers fit intertwined with his own.

"This is worth it." Daryl mutters, because he has to believe it, has to believe that if they can build a world together then it won't matter so much if the rest of the world outside is broken.

"I'm gonna have to take that on faith." Rick says with a soft smile and his eyes closed, and for the first time in a long time there are no shadows on his face.


End file.
